Hood’s work between light and darkness, form and voids, a paradox that may coincide with her difficult childhood. Born in Bryan, Texas in 1918, Hood grew up in Houston and is the only child for a banker’s father and mother to face mental health challenges. As a girl, Hood spent most of her time alone, she turned to painting to soothe. Her parents broke up when she was 11 years old.
Hood is an amazing draft girl who won a scholarship from the Rhode Island School of Design. After RISD, she moved to Manhattan, where she studied in the legendary art student alliance and imitated paying bills.
With two friends, Hood drives Mexico City In 1941. It was a two-week painting journey, but Hood has remained the same for the next 20 years. “I never dreamed of living like this,” Hood recalls. The color of life, A documentary about her in 1985. She fell in love with the freedom she experienced – a far cry from the Victorian ideals her mother tried to instill in, and the history and aesthetics of pre-Colombian art.
Beautiful and charming, she easily made friends in Mexico City, and soon, she was in an environment of anti-war intellectuals and artists including Carlo, Carrington, Remidios Varo, Diego Rivera , Louis Bunier, Louis Bunier and Rufino Tamayo. She has been instructed for ten years José Clemente Orozco, He taught her the importance of authenticity in art. “He always said, ‘Dorothy, tell the truth at all costs. No matter how much it costs,’’ she once said.
In 1943, a solo exhibition from Hood held in Gama, Mexico City.Dorothy Hood Papers, Special Collections, Performance and Visual Arts Studies, University of Houston Library. Courtesy of Hollis Taggart.
