Untitled (From Earth to Haven/​From Haven to Earth)

Media - 2016.38.2 - SAAM-2016.38.2_2 - 141145
Copied Peter "Charlie" Attie Besharo, Untitled (From Earth to Haven/From Haven to Earth), ca. 1950-1960, oil on paper, sheet and image: 22 5⁄8 × 28 3⁄4 in. (57.5 × 73 cm) irregular, Smithsonian American Art Museum, The Margaret Z. Robson Collection, Gift of John E. and Douglas O. Robson, 2016.38.2

Artwork Details

Title
Untitled (From Earth to Haven/​From Haven to Earth)
Artist
Date
ca. 1950-1960
Location
Dimensions
sheet and image: 22 5⁄8 × 28 3⁄4 in. (57.5 × 73 cm) irregular
Credit Line
The Margaret Z. Robson Collection, Gift of John E. and Douglas O. Robson
Mediums Description
oil on paper
Classifications
Keywords
  • Figure group
Object Number
2016.38.2
Linked Open Data
https://edan.si.edu/saam/id/object/2016.38.2

Artwork Description

Peter “Charlie” Attie Besharo made paintings about intergalactic travel and strange beings. Besharo immigrated to the United States around 1912, from Syria. He was a Catholic, but being an ethnic Arab in predominantly white Leechburg, Pennsylvania, created a lasting feeling that he didn’t belong. His imagery was never straightforward and conveys alienation and searching, the artist’s quest to feel at home in a foreign land. Into these semi-narrative, otherworldly spaces, Besharo layered symbols of spirituality, patriotism, divine protection, and his hopes for peace on earth. In this painting, the artist writes the word “heaven” as “haven”—connecting—even if unintentionally—the spiritual cosmos and an earthly place of refuge.
(We Are Made of Stories: Self-Taught Artists in the Robson Family Collection, 2022)

Exhibitions

Media - 2016.38.43R-V - SAAM-2016.38.43R-V_2 - 126225
We Are Made of Stories: Self-Taught Artists in the Robson Family Collection
July 1, 2022–March 26, 2023
Smithsonian American Art Museum
We Are Made of Stories: Self-Taught Artists in the Robson Family Collection traces the rise of self-taught artists in the twentieth century and examines how, despite wide-ranging societal, racial, and gender-based obstacles, their creativity and bold self-definition became major forces in American art. The exhibition features recent gifts to the museum from two generations of collectors, Margaret Z. Robson and Douglas O. Robson.