For Floyd D. Tunson, ascent is inevitable: He’s uncomfortable with comfort. It’s in his DNA to stretch above and beyond, however rigorous the climb. From his humble roots in the Denver’s Platte River Projects to the steep flights of stairs to his Manitou Springs studio, he has risen to become a revered presence in the regional art scene.
Tunson has achieved this status, in part, because viewers have come to understand that his art speaks to truth. This truth can be painful, joyful, or a muddy mixture. Tunson’s visual language can offend, puzzle, or enchant. He creates what’s in his heart, despite the risk of alienating audiences who prefer the “pretty.”
In 1973 Tunson’s unarmed brother, Randolph, was fatally shot by Denver police in City Park. In the 1990s, Tunson initiated his Endangered series, when few wanted to view “awkward” subjects like racism. In 2011, having a bit of serious fun, he created the iconic Universal Bunny figure, as if to say, “You think I’ve never heard the ‘jungle bunnies’ label? Really?” It wasn’t until the 2012 shooting of Trayvon Martin that the American public was finally forced to acknowledge systemic violence against young Black men. Acutely aware of the suffering imposed on vulnerable people across the globe, Tunson created Haitian Dream Boats. Art to truth is evident in the soulful eyes of the endangered young Americans and the desperate young Haitian adrift in the open sea.
Tunson addresses racism in in the context of art history in his Remix series, which provokes questions of why some artists are included in the coffee table books and others are not. Would the work of Matisse and Picasso be there without their African influences? He called out traditional biases in the art world before many viewers and museums were aware of them.
Issues of fairness are hardly confined to the art hierarchy. Consider Gentrification. Sure, the piece is an exquisite abstract painting, but its shades of gray invite questions of the relative value of gentrification, which benefits some residents and businesses, but hurts others displaced from their communities.
Tunson disregards not only political politeness but other expectations of what African-American artists are “supposed” to create. Ascent includes stepping into the risky realm of the non-objective. Although he has worked in this genre since the early 1970s, for decades it was scarcely known that African-American artists created abstract work. An essay in Art News (June 4, 2014) explains that Abstractionist African-Americans, long overlooked, were finally being acknowledged. Indeed, Tunson’s non-objective work is also committed to truth, an esthetic truth of imaginative, effective management of basic elements – light, form, rhythm. His abstract paintings push the limits of palette and composition, as he blends tight structure with spontaneous, emotional strokes – strokes that must justify their existence even in their spontaneity. Non-objective work holds a significant position in Tunson’s ascent, clearly exemplified in his Untitled 147.
Perfection is slippery business: It never reveals a precise identity. But Tunson pursues it nonetheless: Good is never good enough. That’s why scraps of wood and canvas mysteriously appear in dumpsters throughout Manitou Springs – remnants of work that Tunson destroyed to leave no evidence of inferior attempts that can be traced to him. His passion to ascend is all consuming. So if you want to know what day it is, don’t bother asking him: He won’t know, and he won’t care. He’s busy. He’s in the studio, contemplating his best work, which is always the one yet to be created. As Maya Angelou writes,
You may shoot me with your words,
You may cut me with your eyes,
You may kill me with your hatefulness,
But still, like air, I’ll rise.
Wylene Carol