Lloyd Sexton: Kalapana Black Sand Beach

SCHOLARSHIP AUCTION 2009
Artist: Lloyd Sexton
Title: Kalapana Black Sand Beach
Medium: oil on canvas
Dimensions: 16” x 26”
Date: circa 1960

As a second generation Volcano School painter, Lloyd Sexton has attained wide popularity with the rising value and rarity of works by Jules Tavernier and D.H. Hitchcock.  Painting in the latter half of the 20th century, Sexton combined the panoramic Big Island views of his predecessors with the extraordinary photographic realism that emerged after the abstract expressionism of the 1950s. 

In Kalapana Black Sand Beach, Sexton balanced the moody atmosphere of dark storm clouds with the peaceful lapping of waves along the dramatic lava coastline.  The “silent” brushwork of classical realism reveals Sexton’s remarkable accuracy of detail in depicting the topography and vegetation of this scene.  The greenery of the naupaka and windblown palms growing from the stark black lava contrasts perfectly with the translucent turquoise of the sea.  He captured the actual textures and hues of the lava-rimmed cove and black sand beach as no one had done before.  With sensitivity, Sexton balanced the composition as the now verdant lava flow slopes right to meet the ocean’s edge gently moving left. The sun’s rays poke through the clouds to highlight the magnificent beachscape and reveal the wonderful cerulean blue expected on a Big Island day.

Leo Lloyd Sexton, Jr. (1912-1990) was born in Hilo and entered the School of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston in 1931.  In 1933 he had a show of flower paintings at the Vose Galleries in Boston, followed by exhibitions at the Honolulu Academy of Arts and Gump’s in San Francisco.  He spent several years in Europe, painting and traveling during the summers and studying at the Slade School in London during the winters.  In his third and final year of instruction there, one of his figure paintings won first prize, and in 1936 a flower painting was exhibited at the Royal Academy, London.  Sexton returned to Hilo in 1937 and concentrated on figure painting and portraiture.  That same year his painting Nanea was accepted and exhibited at the Royal Academy.

Sexton executed a large number of portraits and beginning in 1934, before he left for Europe, did two commissions for the Hawaiian Pineapple Company.  He was a frequent and popular exhibitor in group shows in Honolulu. He also had one-person shows at Honolulu’s Grossman-Moody Gallery in 1957 and at the Hilton Hawaiian Village Hotel Gallery in 1961.  A retrospective of his work was held at the Contemporary Arts Center, Honolulu Advertiser Gallery, in 1966.  He died in Honolulu in 1990.

Although Sexton is generally known in Hawai'i as an interpreter of the landscape, he was equally interested in depicting flowers.  In fact, Sexton’s first one-person show at the Honolulu Academy of Arts in 1933 consisted of floral works.  A review of the show noted: “Mr. Sexton depends… upon lineal representation, each blossom being carefully drawn from nature.  But by simplifying his tone and color and eliminating modeling so that the surface of the pane is unbroken, the more successful designs acquire a decorative character.”

Hawai'i Preparatory Academy Collections