.Exciting
news for a serious collector of Clementine Hunter's paintings:.
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Read on and discover the many reasons why this painting is so
unique:
#1. Serendipity was in
the cards. When the Rand family of Alexandria, Louisiana, long-time
friends of Cammie Henry, owner of Melrosse Plantation, leased
a site on Cane River to build a fishing camp, they choose the
location for one simple reason: It was the most accessible.
That location was just after crossing a rickety wooden bridge
over the river and entered Melrose Plantation property. A sharp
turn to the left off the main road led to the camp named "Happy
Landing". It was on the river bank only 50 yards away right
next to a cotton field.
Serendipity (or was it destiny?) delt a winning hand, because
in a nearby dwelling lived a person who would forever change
the lives of the Rand family and the lives of many others.
#2. That person was Clementine Hunter, and through her generosity
"Canasta Players"
has the ultimate ironclad provenance: It was hand-delivered
by Clementine to Blythe White Rand while Mrs. Rand was at her
family fishing camp, Happy Landing, on Melrose Plantation.
Clementine's cabin was located just a ten-minute walk across
the neighboring cotton field.
#3. To add to the rarity of this painting, it is exceptional
in that the players, all painted black in Hunter's usual style,
are actually representations of three white ladies that Clementine
knew in the main house on Melrose Plantation. Their names are
known, and they were among the major players in Clementine Hunter's
life.
When Clementine handed Blythe Rand the painting, she told her
that it was a painting of her and Miss Cammie and Miss Caroline
playing canasta. And the name stuck: Canasta Players.
This kind of personal information is known to only a handfull
of owners of Clementine Hunter's works and is an important fact
that makes Canasta Players a collector's item.
#5. As a special bonus: There's a wonderful story behind Canasta
Players from the time Clementine did her first oil painting
Bowl of Zinnias, until now, when Canasta Players
may well become the prized possession of a fortunate new owner.
#6. Authentication: Most important of all, the painting is authenticated
in writing by the acknowledged pre-eminent authority on the works
of Clementine Hunter: Mr. Thomas N. Whitehead of Nachitoches,
Louisiana.
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NOTE:
In addition to Canasta Players, Mrs. Rand's extraordinary
collection included
Clementine Hunter's documented first oil painting, Bowl of
Zinnias,
previously owned by Whitfield Jack and sold to a prominent collector.
The collection also included the seven paintings now in the permanent
collection of the
Smithsonian National Museum of African Americn History and Culture
Canasta Players is truly a member of a Royal Family!
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The Smithsonian
National Museum of
African American History and Culture
CLICK to see the seven Clementine Hunter paintings
in the permanent collection of the
Museum |
These paintings
were donated to the Museum by Mrs. Rand's grandson,
Rand Jack, and his wife, Dana Crowley Jack. |
Click image to enlarge |
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Here's the story of how
it all came to pass ...
...Whitfield Jack Jr.'s grandmother, Blythe White
Rand (left) of Alexandria, Louisiana, shown with Cammie Henry,
owner of Melrose Plantation., about
an hour's drive from Blythe Rand.s home.
The two women had a friendship
for many years starting in the mid 1930's.
Both were expert weavers and shared a passionate love of gardening..They
wove rugs on large commercial looms which, with each change as
the vertical threads were interwoven with the horizontal threads,
made a thumping sound like someone pounding a two-by-four on
a wooden floor.
ÇTogether they paddled a flat-bottomed boat through
the local swamps and bogs in search of the rare Louisiana wild
iris that graced the Melrose gardens. Eventually, as the collection
grew, it became the finest in the entire state.
They were a couple of
brave adventurers, because the swamps were infrested with alligators,
water moccasins, and huge hornet's nests.
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1939 (created image)
Click image to enlarge |
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....
The drive from Alexandria to Melrose was was fine until
you turned off the blacktop highway and headed down a dirt road.
It was a river of dust from the cotton fields when the weather
was dry and a river of mud after a few days of rain.
And if you stopped too long on the blacktop highway at the turn-off
to Melrose, the tires on your car would sink into the tar.
Today, the cotton fields have been replaced by groves of
pecan trees, a more profitable crop.
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Camp Happy Landing on Cane River
Click to see in color
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Camp Happy Landing
still stands on the banks of Cane River on Melrose Plantation,
Melrose, Louisiana. The camp was built in the late 1930s and
was made of natural, unpainted wood, later stained a soft cedar-red.
This photograph was taken in 2006. |
Clementine Hunter's Cabin
Click images to enlarge
A re-creation of how it used to be
The photographs of Clementine and me are added just to give you
an idea what it was like in the very early days when I went to
visit Clementine.
Clementine Hunter image courtesy of GilleysGalllery.com
Baton Rouge, Louisiana
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ÇFrom
Alexandria, Louisiana, where I was born December 23, 1936, it
was about an hours's drive to Melrose Plantation where Clementine
Hunter lived most of her life. From the time I was around eight
years old, my grandmother began taking me to Melrose when she
went to visit Cammie Henry, sometimes staying one day, sometimes
staying a whole week.
ÇOn
those visits, which continued on through my early college years,
I always went to Clementine Hunter's cabin and watched her paint.
I was politely silent, and we became friends, and several times
she painted a picture of me, black and looking like everybody
else. Clementine did paint white people (some people throught
she didn't), she just painted them black.
I was delighted, because Clementine would only paint a picture
of you, or add you to a picture, if she liked you.
She loved children. Not so much adults. The only time I went
inside Clementine's cabin was when a carload of obnoxious tourists
approached, blowing the horn loudly and shouting that they were
coming to buy paintings. Clementine snatched me inside and slammed
the door. When the driver started pounding on the door, Clementine
said, in a gruff voice, "Nobody home". And when the
driver's wife started shouting, "We know you are in there!",
Clementine replied, louder and even gruffier, "NOBODY HOME!
The invaders left empty-handed.
Clementine Hunter's cabin was just one long room from front to
back, a classic worker's cabin known as a "shotgun"
house, because you could shoot a shotgun from the front door
right out of the back door.
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Melrose
Plantation - "The"Big House" |
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