James Hayward was in Minneapolis last month for the opening of his painting exhibition at the gallery of St. John's University in Collegeville Minnesota.This exhibition is a unique one featuring his 14 stations of the cross inspired by Barnett Newman's Stations of The Cross that Hayward saw as a youth in Pasadena Art Museum when Walter Hopps was the director/curator there in the mid 1960's. These were abstract geometric abstractions as are Hayward's paintings.
My wife Pamela and I visited the exhibition last Thursday the gallery is about an hour and twenty minutes outside the Minneapolis metro area.It was well worth the journey. hung with great care in a gallery which is very beautiful in and of itself.The 14 paintings and 3 huge related works are hung in a beautiful chapel like gallery . The presentation is beautiful elegant and informative. Hayward's color and mark marking and craft are extraordinary and can be seen with great clarity in this installation.
A mutual friend Ken Feingold saw an exhibition of Hayward's paintings in New York City that was recently shown in September and October and remarked to me about the extraordinary color in Jim's recent paintings .And I was of the same mind seeing the color in these paintings in Collegeville which are contemporary with the works in New York. This is a very unique show, very rare to see a mature abstractionist at the peak of his powers and mastery in such a unique setting.The show is up until December 7 a catalog is being printed as I write. If you are in the St Cloud area don't miss this once in a lifetime visual spectacle.