This exhibition will present the work of the so-called Florida Highwaymen, a loosely affiliated group of 26 African American landscape painters who sold their vivid and expressive tropical scenes door-to-door and out of the trunks of their cars along the coastal roads of Eastern Florida from the 1950s through the 1980s. Working with a palette of deeply saturated color gesturally applied to inexpensive Upson boards nailed directly to trees, the Highwaymen saw their paintings as a lifesaving economic lifeline and a tool of resistance and resilience. This exhibition will be one of the first of its kind in the Northeast and will introduce new audiences to this underrecognized chapter of American art history.
