Amos Ferguson With Robert Farris Thompson, Professor Emeritus of Art, Yale University. December 2007. Photograph by Erica M. James, PhD
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“To Paint, the Lord gives a vision, a sight that you goes by….”
- Amos Ferguson
Nassau, Bahamas - On
the morning of October 19, 2009 Bahamian Artist and National Monument
Amos Ferguson went home to be with the Lord he had spoken to and
communicated with through his paintings for the past fifty years.
Amos
Ferguson was born in 1920 in Exuma. He received his primary school
education at Roker’s Point School in Exuma. Ferguson came to Nassau in
1937 to learn a trade. He dabbled in various enterprises such as
upholstery and furniture finishing. Finally he went into house painting
and began painting on cardboard, drinking glasses and whatever he could
find after receiving divine instruction. He first sold his works in the
Straw Market but soon made his home on Exuma Street (now Amos Ferguson
Street) his studio.
Possessed
by the vision of God, almost every square inch of the house has been
touched by Ferguson’s brush. He literally lived in his work. Ferguson
is completely self-taught, yet it has taken him some years to receive
the respect and recognition he so richly deserves in The Bahamas. He
once lamented, “I’m known all over the world. The Queen of England owns
one of my paintings and Rajiv Gandhi bought one when he came to The
Bahamas in 1985, but the Bahamian people hardly know I exist and don’t
seem to notice my work.” (Tribune 8.3.91)
Since
that time Ferguson has become the country’s best-known “intuitive”
artist. His distinctive signature “Paint by Amos Ferguson” was also
the title of a successful one-man exhibition held in 1985 at the
Wadsworth Athenaeum in Hartford, Connecticut. The National Art Gallery
of The Bahamas acquired over twenty of his works shortly after opening
in 2003. Formerly exhibited at the Pompey Museum, they now represent a
major holding in the National Collection of The Bahamas.
The
Board, Staff and Members of The National Art Gallery of The Bahamas
extend their deepest sympathy to the family and friends of the late
Amos Ferguson. He was a spirited man, a visionary artist and a Bahamian
treasure. May his soul rest in peace and may his art be a living
epistle to his faith and work.
