EXHIBITION 4

Curtis Lee Fairley

8.2.25 – 19.4.25

You are cordially invited to the opening on Friday, February 7 from 6 – 9 pm.

Curtis Lee Fairley is born in 1927, probably in Birmingham, Ala., where he spends his childhood and teenage years. He joins the U.S. Navy in 1945 and until 1966 serves on eleven different warships. His single longest stint on one ship is on the submarine tender USS Gilmore, where he is stationed from 1950 until 1957. African-Americans face very limited prospects of promotion in the Navy during this time. They are typically assigned to tasks catering to the crew and do not actively take part in combat operations. Fairley works as a cook, running galleys and preparing food for sometimes up to 1,100 people. After over twenty years, Fairly resigns from active service in 1966, enlisting as a reservist for another ten years.

In the 1980s, he is living in a boarding house in New York’s East Village. During the day, he is out in the streets and making drawings. He rummages through garbage and dumpsters for drawing paper and uses the hoods and windshields of parked cars for support.

This is no art—these are just my memories.

Fairley’s drawings are autobiographical, recalling his time in the Navy. They show the places he visited, the seas he saw, or the warships on which he served. They are matter-of-factly sketches, often with annotations. In works like Stuffed Tomatoes (ca. 1987) or Baked Blue Fish (ca. 1987), Fairley also depicts the meals that he served the crew. In firm, lucid pencil strokes and brief descriptive labels, the artist shares his experiences with the viewer. These sober-minded images contrast with the drawings that show combat: the launch of a projectile in Missile Firing 1 (ca. 1987) and Missile Firing 2 (ca. 1987) is rendered with such graphical momentum that one can almost hear the booming noise. The hatched lines Fairley uses to convey the scene’s intensity shatter the neatly marked edges of the picture and cover them with a cloud of smoke.

George Lawrence first encounters Fairley in New York City during the years around 1987, when these works are made. Lawrence, who between 1987 and 1989 likewise works in the East Village, repeatedly comes to see Fairley. Their conversations revolve around Fairley’s work as well as their shared roots in Birmingham. Over time, Lawrence acquires several works. Years later, he undertakes a systematic effort to collect information on Fairley. It is thanks to his research and publications that Fairley’s exceptional oeuvre is not scattered to the winds and that we can now consider it in the context of his life. Aged ninety-three, Fairley dies in Washington, D.C., in 2021.

Our exhibition showcases six works from the Zander Collection, complemented by additional drawings from George Lawrence’s personal collection. We would like to thank Mr. Lawrence for his generous support.

Sammlung Zander gGmbH

Jülicher Str. 24a

50674 Cologne

Milestone Cooperation on Self-Taught and Outsider Artists’ Work in Cologne. The Kunst- und Museumsbibliothek and ZADIK Receive Major Gifts from the Zander Collection

In 1997, Charlotte Zander was the first woman to be honored with the ART COLOGNE Award for her formidable dedication to “naïve art.” Twenty-eight years later, the documentation and scholarly study of the works of self-taught and outsider artists are firmly established in Cologne, with permanent representation at three venues: last fall, the nonprofit Zander Collection inaugurated an exhibition space in Cologne where exhibitions of works from the collection are held on a regular basis. Susanne Zander now gifts the internationally unrivaled specialized library with literature on the collection’s themes to the Kunst- und Museumsbibliothek Köln (KMB), where scholars can access it effective immediately. Meanwhile, the collector, gallery owner, and museum founder Charlotte Zander’s archive has been entrusted to ZADIK, where it is being made accessible to researchers. ZADIK is preparing a thematically focused exhibition, which will open in 2025.

Nadine Oberste-Hetbleck, director of ZADIK, is delighted: “In the extensive archival material documenting Charlotte Zander’s work, ZADIK now possesses a stock of high-quality sources providing insight into her collection-building activities going back to the 1950s. Because she turned her personal passion into a profession, founding a gallery and, later, a museum, the archive also enables us to learn more about the international networks of dealers and museums handling and showcasing ‘naïve art.’”

Susanne Zander, CEO of Sammlung Zander, is confident that the gifts have opened up new avenues of access to the work of self-taught and outsider artists for specialists and the broader public alike: “One objective of our work with the Zander Collection is to facilitate and promote scholarly engagement with this art. We want to establish Cologne as a central setting of such research. The gifts, which also encompass my personal extensive library on so-called outsider art, are a vital step toward this goal. We are moreover developing new projects involving the collection that embed our exhibitions in diverse discursive and scholarly contexts.”

Elke Purpus, director of the Kunst- und Museumsbibliothek, is inviting the interested public to come and start reading: “We have already entered 2,449 publications into our online catalogue—the work is almost complete. We look forward to welcoming many visitors wishing to consult the Zander Library.”

Bringing both an archive and the related specialized library to Cologne is a model that ZADIK and the Kunst- und Museumsbibliothek have successfully implemented in a series of instances. They underscore its advantages: “It is only a short walk from one institution to the other, enabling scholars to take full advantage of the two related sets of holdings—a collaboration we intend to consolidate and expand on.”