Willie Birch
(b. 1942)1977–78 Artist in ResidenceWillie Birch has worked across many artistic styles during his career. He created colorful, figurative works in the 1980s and 1990s, often using papier-mâché. In the 2000s, he switched to depicting life in his hometown of New Orleans through black-and-white paintings and drawings.
Biography
Birch was born and raised in New Orleans. He earned a BA at Southern University and an MFA at Maryland Institute College of Art. After his graduate studies, Birch moved to New York City. He stayed in New York until the 1990s, after which he returned to New Orleans.
In the 1980s and 1990s, while living in New York, Birch primarily created colorful, figurative sculptures using papier-mâché. He also produced watercolors and works on paper during this period. Birch’s subject matter from the time related to Black life and social justice causes, referencing issues such as racialized police violence and solidarity with oppressed groups around the world. Having learned about African diasporic cultural practices during his graduate studies, Birch included allusions to these practices in his works, while also incorporating stylistic influences from United States folk art.
After moving back to New Orleans, Birch switched to making drawings and paintings in grayscale. He depicted everyday Black life in the city, especially his Seventh Ward neighborhood. Birch paints and draws streets, houses, people, and scenes of cultural events in New Orleans, such as parades and Mardi Gras Indian processions. Birch’s artistic approach to this body of work employs a stylized realism full of sharp lines and flat spatial planes stacked one on top of the next.
Birch was an artist in residence at the Studio Museum in Harlem from 1977 to 1978. His work has been exhibited at the Contemporary Arts Center, New Orleans, the New Orleans Museum of Art, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Museum of Modern Art, the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, Hammer Museum, and others. At the Studio Museum, he participated in Passages: Contemporary Art in Translation (2000) and The Blues Aesthetic: Black Culture and Modernism (1990), among other exhibitions.
Willie Birch
(b. 1942)1977–78 Artist in ResidenceWillie Birch has worked across many artistic styles during his career. He created colorful, figurative works in the 1980s and 1990s, often using papier-mâché. In the 2000s, he switched to depicting life in his hometown of New Orleans through black-and-white paintings and drawings.
Biography
Birch was born and raised in New Orleans. He earned a BA at Southern University and an MFA at Maryland Institute College of Art. After his graduate studies, Birch moved to New York City. He stayed in New York until the 1990s, after which he returned to New Orleans.
In the 1980s and 1990s, while living in New York, Birch primarily created colorful, figurative sculptures using papier-mâché. He also produced watercolors and works on paper during this period. Birch’s subject matter from the time related to Black life and social justice causes, referencing issues such as racialized police violence and solidarity with oppressed groups around the world. Having learned about African diasporic cultural practices during his graduate studies, Birch included allusions to these practices in his works, while also incorporating stylistic influences from United States folk art.
After moving back to New Orleans, Birch switched to making drawings and paintings in grayscale. He depicted everyday Black life in the city, especially his Seventh Ward neighborhood. Birch paints and draws streets, houses, people, and scenes of cultural events in New Orleans, such as parades and Mardi Gras Indian processions. Birch’s artistic approach to this body of work employs a stylized realism full of sharp lines and flat spatial planes stacked one on top of the next.
Birch was an artist in residence at the Studio Museum in Harlem from 1977 to 1978. His work has been exhibited at the Contemporary Arts Center, New Orleans, the New Orleans Museum of Art, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Museum of Modern Art, the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, Hammer Museum, and others. At the Studio Museum, he participated in Passages: Contemporary Art in Translation (2000) and The Blues Aesthetic: Black Culture and Modernism (1990), among other exhibitions.