Sign the Virtual Guest Book

For those who weren't able to see it, check out the preview below and sign the virtual guest book.

If you were able to make it to the exhibit in person, Feel free to sign the guestbook again, but this time virtually.

About The Artists

Clyde Santana received a B.S. from Springfield College in 1973 and an M.F.A. from the University of Massachusetts, Amherst in 1975.

Initially, a muralist who painted or coordinated eleven mural projects from 1971 to 1976 starting in Springfield, Ma at Springfield College where he painted three murals, then on to the University of Massachusetts where he designed / co-designed and painted another eight in Mt Holyoke College, the city of Springfield and the University of Massachusetts, Amherst in the W.E. B. Dubois African American Center. Both Clement Roach and Clyde received a professional show of their artwork at the Studio Museum in Harlem one month after receiving their MFAs from the University of Massachusetts Amherst in the spring of 1975.

During a six-year period in New Jersey, initially as an Artist in residence at the New Jersey State Council on the Arts, Clyde traveled as a Muralist in Residence to eight school districts in New Jersey coordinating mural projects with school-age students in eight school districts from 1976 to 1978. From 1978 to 1981, he coordinated the New Jersey Dept. of Education’s Special Arts Project which places Women and Minority Artists of various disciplines in the six NJ school districts.

For the past 30 years, he has co-authored plays for three community children's theaters with his wife, the late Gail Davis. Initially, the “Phantom of the 87th Street Playground” received its first production in Florence, South Carolina, produced and directed by Herman Levern Jones. He then coordinated children’s theater projects in Norfolk Va. With Margie Day Walker’s “Centerstage Children’s Theater,” the theater responsible for initially training Tominita Booth and Derrick Williams who both played in Clyde’s Phantom of the 87th Street Playground, their first major children’s theater production and “The Dance Theater of Norfolk” which he co-founded in 1988 with Sam Rountree.

Also, two co-written Equity-produced plays, “Bo! The Musical” and “Phantom of the 87th Street Playground” were world premiered at Bushfire Theater of Performing Arts in Philadelphia, Pa. where he was a co-recipient of a National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) Creation and Presentation Award in 2000 for the musical theater play, "Bo!"

Recently, his fantasy stage play, “OOPS” which received a workshop production in 2019 at Zeiders American Dream Theatre was accepted to be read at the NBTF 2022 by the Garland Lee Thompson Sr. Readers Theater in Winston Salem NC. His stage play comedy, “Likker Outta Control” won the Proteus Festival 2022 New Plays audience favorite and was given a two-week full staged production at Zeiders American Dream Theatre in November 2022.

From 2016 to the present, Clyde currently teaches public arts / mural painting and visual arts courses at Norfolk State University as an adjunct professor. The fourteen indoor and outdoor murals designed and painted by his students grace the downtown Norfolk area in the African American Community. Also, when requested by the theater Department, he teaches drama and playwriting courses for the University. Additionally, Clyde Taught the Attucks Writers Workshop which he founded from 2009 to 2017. The Attucks Writers Workshop trained a 2016 O’Neill Playwrights Conference Semifinalist. Clyde continues to teach the American Dreamwrights Playwrights Workshop which he founded in 2017 at Zeiders American Dream Theater, Virginia Beach, Va. Also, teaches the playwrights workshops as needed for Bushfire Theater of Performing Arts / Lincoln University’s Langston Hughes Playwrights Workshop since 2013.

About the Exhibit

Murals Masters: The art of Clyde Santana and Clement Roach is a celebration of two great African American artists whose paint brushes and hands have touched walls all across the United States.

This exhibit is offered in and dedicated to the memory of Iconic Muralist, Nelson Stevens who was supposed to be a part of this exhibit but unfortunately passed away last year. We honor him and his artistic legacy.

Words from the late Nelson Stevens

“Clement Roach and Clyde Santan are creative geniuses, layering images and color together with such power and skill that it would take a brain surgeon’s precision to separate these elements in the viewer’s head.”

“They are young investigators and inventors who have used their private studios and public labs to sharpen their perception and skills. Their public labs are the streets of Springfield, Mass. where they have labored long and hard marking drab urban walls jump bad with the personal and collaborative mural imagery.”

“Clement & Clyde are not the creators but the instruments of, through which the creator’s current flow. Fortunately, it is the current underlying their work which gives the viewer a better understanding of himself and the creator.”

Related Programming:

An Opening Reception will take place on Thursday, Jan. 12, 2023, from 6:30 to 7:30 p.m. to mark the opening of the exhibition from Dec. 17 through Jan. 31, 2023.


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Reception Images

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Exhibit Images

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