Lucie Monk Carter
Over the course of his thirty-five years in Los Angeles, Zachary native Larry Square developed a deep passion for fine art, accumulating a massive and diverse collection. IN 2004, he and his wife Gay brought it all home, where—in the house he designed—he could finally display it for all to see.
One day, in her tiny home in Inglewood, California, Caddo Parish native Gay Square noticed something was just off about her living room. Her days had been filled to the brim with the bedlams of working motherhood—but she thought to herself, How have I not noticed this before? Her couch seemed to have slowly inched its way into the near center of her living room! Sure, she had peripherally noticed the pile of brown parcels behind it, but how it had grown! What is this stuff? Peeling back the paper on the nearest package, she unveiled a painting—a work of fine art filled with black bodies and black faces. And then another, and another. And another.
Telling this story decades later, her husband Larry laughed, “ I guess we never really talked about my collecting. I just didn’t bring it up!”
Today, Larry’s collection no longer hides behind a couch in California but is proudly displayed on walls designed precisely for the purpose of holding it, bathed in natural light pouring from the windows of the Squares’ home in Zachary, Louisiana. “I didn’t see all of this until we moved here [in 2004], not really until we started pulling it out,” said Gay. “I didn’t know. . .we had all of this.”
It started in the ‘70s, Larry said. Born and raised in Zachary, after graduating from Grambling State University in 1968, he turned West in hopes of starting a career in teaching. Unbeknownst to him at the time, an acquaintance of his from the university—who was to later become his wife of almost fifty years, was making the very same trip for the very same reasons. As fate would have it, Larry and Gay reunited at the 1968 Pasadena Bowl at Rose Bowl Stadium, where Grambling beat Sacramento State 34-7. And the two have been together ever since.
"When I see it, it calls me. And I call it"
Living in Los Angeles, where art shows and gallery openings are regular occurrences, Larry was exposed to art like nothing he had seen growing up in Louisiana, “and I wanted it.” He began to immerse himself in the literature of fine arts, craving an understanding of the history, the forms, the styles, the various movements. “I wanted to know what gives certain pieces of art value over others,” he said.
Larry began to develop relationships with other collectors and artists. “[I found most of my pieces] just searching and looking and seeing where certain artists were having shows. Meeting friends and having a group where we could get together and exchange ideas; we’d let each other know if we found something we thought someone would like to have. Just a bunch of art lovers.”
Larry said that what ultimately draws him to a piece is its historical significance—“I look for things that tell a story.” While his collection is striking in its diversity—sculpture, paintings, sketches; of abstract, expressionist, realist, and modern styles—it is tied together by its overwhelming expression of the African American story, featuring nationally renowned artists like Jacob Lawrence, John T. Scott, Annie Lee, Charles Dickson, Elizabeth Catlett and many more. “I wanted to have something we could relate to,” he said. “And I wanted African American art because [those artists] didn’t always receive recognition as fine artists.”
Lucie Monk Carter
Adorning the shoulders of Tina Allen's rendering of Malcolm X is a stole commemorating Larry and Gay's recent fifty year class reunion at Grambling University, where the couple first met.
Though Larry’s collection was born in Los Angeles, where he and Gay spent thirty-five happy years and raised their children, it came to life in his home-town of Zachary, Louisiana. “I was collecting the prints and the paintings, but I had no room for them,” he said. “I always said one day I’d be able to unwrap them, open them up.” The two moved home thirteen years ago and designed a house exactly as Larry wanted it, with ample wall space and lots of light. “It feels good [to be able to see my art],” he said. “It becomes a part of your life, a part of your family.”
Over the years, Larry has shared his treasures with galleries and art shows across the country from St. Louis to Atlanta to Alabama. This month, over forty pieces from his collection will be displayed at the West Baton Rouge Museum in an exhibition called THE SQUARE COLLECTION. Of the show, Exhibit Curator Kathe Hambrick said, “A Louisiana collector, from a rural community, with such an interesting collection of African American art—this is what we’re all about!”
“I look for things that tell a story.”
Of particular interest to Hambrick are Larry’s twenty-five Tina Allen sculptures—twenty of which will be displayed for the exhibit. “Tina Allen, when you look at her sculptures, the faces are real-life images of African American men and women,” she said. “They are not caricatures, which is sometimes the way art of African Americans was presented. Her contemporary sculptures are real life images of faces of African American people.” Some of Allen’s most famous works were monuments to major figures in African American history, ranging from Sojourner Truth to Martin Luther King to Tupac. Her studies in movement, crafting figures inspired in part by the dancers of the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theatre, were also beloved by collectors around the world. She is known to have characterized her work as “totems that tell children this kind of behavior, this kind of person, is worthy of attention.”
[Read this: Judith Braggs creates fabric art based on memories of her plantation childhood.]
Larry met Allen early on in his art-collecting journey through his trophy and awards business in Los Angeles, and they developed a friendship as well as a working relationship—as he often crafted the stands and name-plates for her works—that lasted until her death in 2008. Larry possesses originals or limited-edition versions of some of her most famed pieces, including busts of Malcolm X and Frederick Douglass, as well as several of her dancing figures, most notably “Eclipse” and “Firebird.”
The West Baton Rouge’s exhibit is about more than just the collection, though, said Hambrick. “It’s going to be curated to ask the question: ‘What makes people collect?’” She added, “Some people collect sports memorabilia, some people collect butterflies, angels, Saints stuff, and some people collect art. And then of course, some people are interested in African American art and ephemera. I’m interested in Larry, in asking, ‘What makes you want to collect this?’”
Lucie Monk Carter
Of the dozens of artists in Larry Square's collection, Tina Allen is represented the most. Allen was internationally recognized as a master of capturing the African American likeness in sculpture.
When asked about the process of choosing art, Larry described a kind of spiritual experience, a powerful intuition: “When I see it, it calls me. And I call it.” The works of art to which he is drawn evoke a deeper connection to the collective memory of the African American experience. Walking through Larry and Gay’s home, seeing so many diverse interpretations of that experience, brought together in one space as they are, one participates in an exploration and celebration of this history. “It’s a twentieth century history lesson,” said Hambrick. “It’s a lesson in twentieth century history through paintings and sculpture.”
[Read this: Jeremy Simien's growing art collection focuses on rare depictions of Creoles of color.]
And it’s a lesson that the Squares invite others to share in. In addition to the dozens of shows in which Larry’s collection has been featured, he has often opened up his home to families and groups including, recently, his church’s youth group in celebration of Black History Month. It’s a lesson, he said, that he hopes he can one day share and teach to his grandchildren.
“This whole thing just happened,” he said. “And I love it. Art is something you have to love, and you have to really develop that kind of love. It’s a passion. My collection may not be the greatest. It may not be the biggest. But it’s mine, and it’s the greatest to me.”
THE SQUARE COLLECTION will be on exhibit at the West Baton Rouge Museum from January 19 to March 24. Visit westbatonrougemuseum.com for more information.
