BARBARA JOHNSON ZUBER (1926 - 2019) Processional

BARBARA JOHNSON ZUBER (1926 - 2019)

Processional Women.

Oil on cotton canvas, circa 1972-74. 711x1524 mm; 28x60 inches.Provenance: the artist's estate; thence by descent, private collection, New York.The inspiration for this painting comes from Barbara Zuber's childhood memories of watching the weekly parades in Harlem of the Eastern Stars. Her aunt Beatrice was a member of the Masonic organization the Order of the Eastern Star.Born in Philadelphia, Barbara Zuber was raised in New York. She was the first woman to graduate with a Bachelor of Fine Arts from Yale University - she also studied at the Art Students League and New York University. She began a teaching career in New York public schools, community centers and at the Harlem Hospital in the Child Psychiatry Department. Her artwork focuses on celebrating the daily life of African Americans with an emphasis on children. Her art illustrated the 1969 children's book Brown is a Beautiful Color written by Jean Carey Bond. In 1970, after briefly moving to Croton, NY, Zuber and her family moved to Troy, NY. Zuber exhibited in the 1970 15 Afro-American Women at North Carolina A&T State University and the 1972 A New Vitality in Art: The Black Woman at Mount Holyoke College. She also has exhibited her work at the Indianapolis Museum of Art, the Gibbes Museum of Art, and the Montgomery Museum of Fine Arts. In 1999, New York State commissioned Zuber to create the painting for The Adoption Album: Our Children, Our Families poster.This is only the second painting by the artist to come to auction; Swann Galleries sold the Zuber's Jump Rope in the auction African American Art from the Johnson Publishing Company on January 30, 2020.