Carlos Alpha "Shiney" Moon

Carlos Alpha "Shiney" Moon was a prominent Alabama artist of the 1940s and 1950s.

Moon was born in Birmingham in 1906, although his his family moved to Andalusia while Carlos was a child. Moon attended Alabama Polytechnic Institute in 1927-1928. His emergence as an artist did not occur until his introduction to the Dixie Art Colony and the tutelage of its mentor, Kelly Fitzpatrick, in 1944. Moon applied himself to the use of oils, a medium he used almost exclusively until 1946, the year of his first one-man show at the Montgomery Museum of Fine Arts. During an extended working trip to the Carolinas with Fitzpatrick, Moon changed his medium of choice to watercolor. "Shiney" further developed his watercolor technique painting in and around New Orleans, in the bayous and on the barrier islands of the Gulf.

With Fitzpatrick and water colorist Genevieve Southerland as co-instructors, Moon helped found the Bayou Art Colony in Bayou la Batre, Alabama. Continuing to hone his watercolor skills, Shiny painted extensively at the coast and studied with Morris Davidson at Provincetown, Massachusetts. Moon's work was exhibited throughout the eastern United States, in numerous one-man shows, in galleries, museums and in art association competitions.

Works include "Shell Road (Post Office, Coden, AL)" (c. 1948-1952) and "Vortices with Houses" (c. 1950), both of which are in the Mobile Museum of Art.

Moon's prizes and awards include: Alabama Art League, First Prize, 1947; Watercolor Society of Alabama, Second Place, 1947; Alabama Art League, Burton Award, 1950; Mobile Watercolor Society, Art Center Award, 1951; Alabama Art League, Loveman, Joseph and Loeb Purchase Prize, 1951 and Watercolor Society of Alabama, Mobile Art Center Award, 1953. Moon served as president of the Watercolor Society of Alabama and as vice-president of the Alabama Art League. Moon died in 1953.

References

  • Williams, Lynn Barstis: "Shiney Moon: From Merchant to Artist," Alabama Heritage:67, Winter 2003.

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