David Black
In November 2008 U.S. Ambassador Robert Godec invited Artist and Fulbright Scholar David Black to Tunisia to conduct workshops with six artists. In turn, Tunisian Collaborative Painting (TCP) creator Hechmi Ghachem invited Black to participate in an experience that would change his life forever. “Half a world away I stumbled on a new concept for creating art, a concept simple yet profound, mysterious but obvious, a concept which celebrates the oneness of all human beings and the wonder of the creative process,” states Black.
TCP was created by Ghachem in 1988 to help artists survive under the regime of President Ben Ali. Inspired by this fascinating, vital and politically relevant new democratic form of artistic expression, Black made it his mission to bring TCP to the United States. His dream was also to bring the artists who developed this method to America, which at the time was politically impossible. Instead Ghachem suggested that Black introduce TCP to America. In February 2010, Black conducted the first session of Tunisian Collaborative Painting in America at the Lyme Academy College of Fine Arts. In November of 2010 Black conducted workshops at the Art Students League of New York. Over a period of five days 125 artists from 30 countries created 26 paintings, and each of the finished paintings looked like the work of a single artist. This fall, Hechmi Ghachem and Tunisian artists Mourad Zerai and Olfa Jegham will make their first trip to America to participate in a workshop November 14-18 at the Art Students League of New York...and you're invited.
