Romare Bearden

Bearden captures a timeless scene: two guitarists and a banjo player creating music together. Bearden’s work broke from traditional artistic forms. Three Folk Musicians is one of Bearden’s most beloved works, celebrating the enduring legacy of Black American folk music. With flattened forms and bold contrasts. Bearden remains a celebrated figure in American art, known for his unconventional style and enduring influence.

Three Folk Musicians is one of Bearden’s most beloved works, celebrating the enduring legacy of African-American folk music. With flattened forms and bold contrasts, Bearden captures a timeless scene: two guitarists and a banjo player creating music together. Beyond its formal innovation, the work resonates as a tribute to cultural survival and the power of shared sound.

Here, Bearden pares down the cacophony, focusing instead on three figures—two banjo players and a guitarist—posed with reverence and warmth. Though the collage format remains bold and modern, the subject matter nods to folk and blues traditions of the rural South, where Bearden spent summers as a child.

The figures are built from photo clippings and textured papers. Their instruments anchor the scene, evoking the roots of American music in storytelling, labor, and survival. This work hums with the quiet dignity of tradition—one passed down, altered, but never lost.

Bearden’s Musical Collaborations
Bearden wasn’t an outsider looking in on music culture—he was part of it. Throughout his life, he cultivated deep friendships with legendary musicians, including Duke Ellington, Alvin Ailey, and Wynton Marsalis. His Harlem studio was a gathering space, not just for visual artists but for composers, dancers, and thinkers.

He also contributed artwork for several album covers and concert posters, further blurring the lines between visual and auditory art forms. His cover for Donald Byrd’s New Perspective (1963) is just one example, capturing the bold, boundary-pushing spirit of hard bop and gospel fusion.

These collaborations weren’t simply decorative—they were extensions of shared cultural work. Bearden and his musical peers saw themselves as part of a long tradition of Black creative innovation, reaching back through blues and spirituals, forward into free jazz and Afro-futurism.

Three Folk Musicians, 1967