MARTIN COUNTY, Fla. — There’s an exhibition on display at the Elliott Museum in Stuart that features some of the greatest artists in Florida history.
They are “The Highwaymen,” African-American artists that only now are being recognized.
Roger Lightle began collecting Highwaymen art a quarter century ago.
“They have a painting style that’s very unique,” he said, looking over a work of Roy McLendon’s.
He now owns hundreds of their works.
“Some of these iconic images. Landscapes. What drew people to Florida? Landscapes— the sun, the warm weather,” said Lightle.
Several are hanging on the walls of the Elliott Museum in Stuart as part of a new exhibition “Highwaymen, from the street corner to the Smithsonian.”
“This story has remained untold to the world for so, so long,” said Elliott Museum CEO Rob Steele.
Of the original 26 first generation artists, only seven are still alive.
A 91st birthday party was held recently at the Elliott Museum for artist McLendon, who WPTV caught up with in Wellington back in February.
Shut out from traditional galleries in the 1950s and 1960s, McLendon and other Treasure Coast based artists would sell their work along the side of the road, and wherever they could find clients.
“We’d sell them at the doctor's office, the lawyer's office, anywhere we could sell a painting,” McLendon told us then.
When the Highwaymen would sell their paintings on the side of the road, they would get $25, maybe $35, for them. Today, these paintings can run in the tens of thousands of dollars.
If that’s too rich for you, for $25, you can enter in a raffle for an original Highwaymen work, with the proceeds benefiting the museum.
“I’ve had people make comments to me that this is going to be as big as Motown. The next big thing coming,” said Steele.
Steele believes that every museum will be clamoring in the next year or two to have their own Highwaymen exhibition.
“These wonderful undiscovered artists, and we hope that everything possible that can accrue to those artists happens for them,” said Steele.
Lightle said these artists are truly an American treasure.
“Each and every one of these artists has a story. Their story. A success story,” he said.
The exhibition runs through July 14.