Ben Wigfall Perpetuity Project

Who is Ben Wigfall?

Benjamin Leroy Wigfall (1930-2017) was born in Richmond, Virginia. Wigfall attended art classes as a high school student at the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts (VMFA), which funded his college education at Hampton Institute where he got a BS in art education in 1949. His professors recognized his extraordinary talent and urged him to pursue graduate work. Wigfall went on to study at University of Iowa and Yale School of Design.

During the 1950’s, his artwork developed a national reputation. Although he continued creating art, he did not pursue an exhibition career, choosing instead the multiple paths of educator, community mentor, and gallerist.

Founding of Communications Village

Wigfall came to SUNY New Paltz in 1963 as an instructor of 2-D design and drawing. When he first arrived, he was the only African American faculty member on the campus. He served on committees to recruit students of color and in 1969 became one of the founders of the Black Studies Department (the second such department in the country).

Dissatisfied with the lack of SUNY’s outreach to students of color, he bought an abandoned mule barn in the largely African American community of Ponckhockie in Kingston and started Communications Village in 1973.

Communications Village quickly became an attraction for the neighborhood youth, many of whom had only a limited experience with art. Wigfall introduced them to printmaking, photography, oral history, and contemporary working artists. Wigfall saw communication itself as an art and a form of daily survival skills.

“Communications Village was conceived to explore formats which orchestrate traditional art and survival activities into one total expression.” – Ben Wigfall

Neighborhood youth received training as printing assistants and worked alongside the now legendary visiting artists whom Wigfall invited up from New York and Virginia. These included Romare Bearden, Robert Blackburn, Benny Andrews, Betty Blayton, Melvin Edwards, Jayne Cortez, Charles Gaines, Mavis Pusey, Ernest Crichlow, Ernie Frazier,Everett Winrow and Joe Gonzalez.

Communications Village reflected a shared ethos among many African American artists, which was the importance of working in direct relationship with their communities.

“There have been people…who have lived every day of their lives in the background, never comprehending what they were taking and all they were giving…[Wigfall’s] object was to reach those people, especially his Black neighbors, whose experiences have never afforded them the chance to feel relevant, to feel vitally alive.”
-Kingston Daily Freeman Article 1977 describing Wigfall’s motivation.

Communications Village lasted until 1983 after cutbacks from CETA, the Federal funding that had helped support it. From 1988-2008 Ben Wigfall began and ran the Watermark/Cargo Gallery in Kingston’s developing art community. The gallery continued Wigfall’s concern to promote African American artists, as he had done on the SUNY campus and in Communications Village.

Long after Communications Village ended its impact on the Kingston Community is immeasurable. Midtown Kingston started a program inspired by Ben Wigfall and began Neighborhood Print Studio. NPS began with the intention of being a meeting place for artists for accessible print education/facilities and a training ground for our Youth Workforce to build their skills in printmaking and collaborate with working artists. As stewards of Ben Wigfall’s press we want to emphasize the importance of accessible arts education in youth. Art is a survival activity and communication can have an inconceivable large impact on our community member’s lives.

“Communications Village seeks to provide new formats for expression by the public in such a way that the vitality, profundity and beauty of their lives is revealed to themselves and society.”