Father’s Art: Works of Billy Charles Duvall [8]

Oil and acrylic on masonite; 48" x 34". July 1984.
Photo by Moristotle, 2015

Mujer Tropical

By André Duvall

Today, April 23, in honor of Billy Charles Duvall’s birthday, I offer a new installment of Father’s Art. Happy Birthday and much love, Dad!
    Dad’s Mujer Tropical is another of his creations that I remember seeing all throughout my childhood. The first of his three open-frame paintings, it was inspired by the people and natural landscape of Honduras, where he travelled to meet my mom, a native of that nation, for the first time.¹
    The different colorful segments represent aspects of Honduras’ natural landscape and people as he remembered them. The yellow band is the tropical sun. The green leaf represents lush vegetation. The black and white stripes and reddish-pink polka-dots represent the colorful clothing of the Honduran people, but the curves of the black and white stripes may also symbolize the waves of the ocean. The large black area represents dual ideas: the shape of the open frame suggests either the silhouette of a woman, outlining her torso and bust, or the head of a nun. The blue oval is the ocean, and this closeup photo will help you see the brushstroke detail of the waves: 

    The idea for the shape of the open frame came about by accident, when working on a preparatory sketch of another open-frame work, The Last Man, featured in my introductory installment of Father’s Art. When trying to get the perspective right between the two towers, Dad envisioned creating a second painting that would imply a second tower’s existence without its being visible. To do this, he played around with sketches in a notebook for open-frame designs. After a while, he realized that the shape he had created for Mujer Tropical could be part of a human head or of a woman’s bust. The final shape appeared by itself after little modifications over time. But if it hadn’t been for trying to modify a previous work, he probably wouldn’t have come up with this one. Dad says that when creating art, at least from his experience, as you go along you realize that no matter how much you want to do something, the art takes over and makes the decisions for which direction it is going to take.

Since 2002, Mujer Tropical has graced the main lobby of the Statehouse Convention Center on President Clinton Avenue (formerly East Markham Street) in Downtown Little Rock, Arkansas. Of the pieces of art Dad has entered in festivals or competitions, this is the only one that has ever been accepted by judges.
    Dad figured he didn’t have much of a chance when he entered in “The Invitational 2002” art festival of the Little Rock Convention and Visitor’s Center Bureau, but sent in a slide photograph anyway, and they accepted it. Several area artists’ works were displayed throughout the convention center for several weeks. After the exhibit ended, Dad received a general letter to the participants asking if anyone wanted to donate their paintings to the center to be a part of their permanent collection.
    Dad agreed to donate Mujer Tropical, and he was asked to set a price. He didn’t know how to set a price for a piece of art, so he just made up a figure! He had no idea how long it would be displayed. He figured that in a few weeks, or perhaps months, it would be rotated out. After all, it was featured in one of the most prominent locations in the whole Convention Center, visible even through the glass walls to people walking or driving along Clinton Avenue from the Capital Hotel.
    Yet, as piece after piece of the other entrants were removed over time, Dad’s remained. A few of the other original entrants’ works remained a few years, as well, but they too were eventually removed. Dad always figured his would be next, put in a closet somewhere, but here we are 19 years later, and it still remains. It always baffled him, but he is incredibly grateful and humbled to have it remain in place. I am grateful, too. It is a good feeling when visiting home and taking a drive downtown, to see my father’s art displayed in the heart of Little Rock.²

I remember Dad asking me to help him write the descriptive paragraph for Mujer Tropical that had been requested by the convention center, to be displayed on a plaque beneath the painting. We came up with a paragraph Dad was very happy with, but when we saw the completed plaque, someone had radically changed and edited what we wrote. However, Dad said this other person’s words still captured some essence of Dad’s intentions, even if the wording resembled nothing of what we submitted. As we cannot find the original paragraph, you can read the text of the plaque here:

Photo by Moristotle, 2015

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1. The other two open-frame paintings are featured in previous posts: Island Woman and Passage to Paradise.
2. Mujer Tropical has actually been accepted in two exhibitions. Many years earlier, he entered it in a festival, and the painting was accepted for display in an exhibit in Arkadelphia, Arkansas. It went on display for several weeks, and Dad waited until the last day to see it, but they had just taken everything down when he and Mom arrived.

Copyright © 2021 by André Duvall & Billy Charles Duvall