James Havard: Color, Pattern and Texture
December 4th - December 23rd, 2025
James Havard (American, 1937-2020)
As a pioneer of abstract illusionism in the 1970s, James Havard was inspired by many different art movements and artists He received his Bachelor of Science degree in art from Sam Houston State Collection in Huntsville, Texas in 1959. There he was influenced by realist painters Ben Kamihira and Hobson Pittman and much of his early work depicted traditional landscapes, churches, and figuration. From 1961 – 1965 he studied at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts and received his CFA degree in 1967.
In the 1970s, Havard pioneered Abstract Illusionism along with artists Al Held, John Clem Clarke, and George Green. The work of his era included optical illusions typically in pastel colors and included chalk drawings, incised lines, and lines of paint squeezed directly from the tube He moved to New York City in 1977 where his palette became darker and richer in texture.
Beginning in 1978, Havard began taking frequent trips to Santa Fe, New Mexico and his style of painting began to incorporate Native American images and words, influenced by artists who resided there as well as his exposure to the Native American culture In the 1980s, still living in New York, his paintings incorporated more collage elements, thicker applications of paint, and less optical illusions.
James Havard moved to Santa Fe permanently in 1989 and freed himself of his earlier abstract illusionism. He began using encaustic as his preferred medium at this stage of his career, which allowed him to draw directly into the media, and his work took on a luminous appearance His palette became much darker than his earlier pastels and his style became more naïve and instinctual, inspired by outsider art and tribal imagery.
In 2006, Havard suffered a stroke and was no longer able to walk but continued to paint. His works became much smaller in dimension due to his limited mobility, but they continued to be powerfully expressive works until his death in 2020
He exhibited extensively for over fifty years in the United States and Europe through solo exhibitions, and his work is held in the permanent collections of the Metropolitan Museum of Art (New York), Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum (New York), Los Angeles County Museum of Art (California), Smithsonian Institute (Washington D C ) and Museum of Modern Art (Stockholm) as well as the Tucson Museum of Art (Arizona) among others
Many catalogs have been published about James Havard and in 2006, Julie Sasse, a respected curator, released James Havard, the first extensive monograph of Havard's work. It includes more than 120 color plates and illuminating texts that describe his process and artistic development, and which situate this body of work in the context of the artist's life
The Larsen Gallery is pleased to present over 30 works in this exhibition spanning James Havard’s entire career, with the earliest work in the exhibition dated 1973 and the latest from 2000.
1975
Untitled, 1975 Mixed Media on Board 40 x 30 (in) $12,000
Dallas, 1976 Mixed Media on Board 32 x 40 (in) $12,000
Fossil Bed 1295, 1989 Mixed Media on Paper 33 x 28 (in) $9,000
New Mexico History Page 970, 1990 Monotype and Mixed Media Collage on Paper 26 x 22 (in) $5,500
New Mexico History Page 1275 AD, 1990 Monotype and Mixed Media Collage on Paper 35 x 29 (in) $7,000
Mexico History Page 1292, 1990 Monotype and Mixed Media Collage on Grey Paper
Splayed Figure 1250, 1992 Monotype and Mixed Media on Paper 43.5 x 34 (in) $12,000
Full image illustrated on page 17.