Alma Thomas

Alma Thomas was a woman of “firsts” – the first graduate of the Fine Art Department at Howard University, the first African American to receive a Master of Art degree in art education from Columbia University in New York City in 1934, and the first African American woman to be honored with a solo show at the Whitney Museum of American Art in 1972. Introduced to Kenneth Noland, Gene Davis, and the Washington Color Field group in the 1950’s, Thomas began to create compositions of pure exuberant color. Her work was a distillation of a long study of color theory at American University as well as watercolors, costume and marionette design, and abstraction. Her works are marked by strong design, a large scale format, and pure colors to create her signature abstractions that were gestural in style, often incorporating pencil lines alongside her active brushstrokes. Thomas supported herself by teaching and working at the Barnett Aden Gallery that she helped to establish and at “The Little Paris Studio”. The Barnett Aden Gallery was the first such establishment to exhibit modern American Art. The gallery also introduced then unknown black artists to the public.