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Harry Fonseca

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Photography by Edward C. Robison III.
Harry Fonseca
Photography by Edward C. Robison III.

Harry Fonseca

Nisenan Maidu, Hawaiian, Portuguese, 1946 - 2006
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BiographyHarry Fonseca (1946-2006) was born in Sacramento, California of Nisenan Maidu, Hawaiian, and Portuguese heritage. Recently, October 2014, the Eiteljorg Museum in Indianapolis announced a large donation of Fonseca works, over 80, to its collection. The artwork is accompanied by volumes of photographs, cards and letters documenting Fonseca's legacy and relationship with donor Harry Nungesser.

In his long career as an exhibiting artist, Harry Fonseca's work went through a number of transformations, but the one constant was his openness to new influences and sources of inspiration. Fonseca began the Coyote Series in 1979. The subject of these works is Coyote, the trickster and transformer. Fonseca re-situated this cultural hero into contemporary settings, such as San Francisco's Mission District. Coyote appears as an updated and sneaker-wearing Rousseau, holding his palette on a Parisian quay ('Rousseau Revisited', 1986), or a headress-clad and sneakered ('Coyote in Front of Studio', 1983). Coyote became an alembic through which Fonseca filtered his vision of the artist and the Native American in society.

[Retrieved on 9/2/2020 from https://chiaroscurosantafe.com/artists/40/]
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