Dusti Bongé

1903 - 1993

Born in Biloxi, Mississippi, Dusti Bongé (neé Eunice Lyle Swetman), enjoyed a long and successful career from the deep South to Chicago, New York and back. As a painter she evolved from Cubism and Surrealism in the 1930s and 40s to Abstract Expressionism in the 1950s. She maintained a long friendship with NY dealer Betty Parsons and showed regularly in Parsons namesake gallery. Bongé was recently honored with a retrospective exhibition, "Piercing the Inner Wall: The Work of Dusti Bongé" at the Ogden Museum of Southern Art in New Orleans and the Mississippi Museum of Art in Jackson. Since her death her estate has been managed by the Dusti Bongé Art Foundation in Biloxi. In 2019 the Foundation published a 350 page book by J. Richard Gruber on her art and Life.

Dusti Bongé (1903 - 1993)
Dusti in her Biloxi, MS, studio in 1957
Dusti Bongé (1903 - 1993)
Woman with Brown Body Scrubbing, c.1941
mixed media on paper
11 x 13 1/4 inches
signed at lower right, titled
#12812
Dusti Bongé (1903 - 1993)
Dusti in her Biloxi, MS, studio in 1957
Dusti Bongé (1903 - 1993)
Woman with Brown Body Scrubbing, c.1941
mixed media on paper
11 x 13 1/4 inches
signed at lower right, titled
#12812
Dusti Bongé (1903 - 1993)
Untitled (Surrealist Composition with Face), c.1945
mixed media on paper
8 1/2 x 11 1/4 inches
signed at upper left
#12814
Dusti Bongé (1903 - 1993)
Untitled (Surrealist Circus Scene), c.1945
mixed media on paper
16 3/4 x 13 3/4 inches
signed at lower right
#12813
Dusti Bongé (1903 - 1993)
Untitled (Inside the Circus Tent), c.1945
watercolor on paper
16 3/4 x 13 inches
signed at lower right
#12815
Dusti Bongé (1903 - 1993)
Untitled (Surrealist Figure), c.1945
charcoal on paper
16 3/4 x 14 inches
#12817
Dusti Bongé (1903 - 1993)
Untitled (Surrealist Mother and Child), c.1945
charcoal on paper
16 3/4 x 14 inches
#12816
Dusti Bongé (1903 - 1993)
Untitled (Black Abstract), 1954
ink on paper
26 x 20 inches
signed and dated at lower right
#12818
Dusti Bongé (1903 - 1993)
Untitled (Black Totems), 1955
mixed media on paper
26 x 20 inches
signed and dated at lower right
#12820
Dusti Bongé (1903 - 1993)
Untitled (Black and Peach Lines), c.1955
tempera on paper
17 x 14 inches
#12821
Dusti Bongé (1903 - 1993)
Untitled (Olmec Figure), c.1955
watercolor and ink on paper
17 3/4 x 11 3/4 inches
signed at lower right
#12823
Dusti Bongé (1903 - 1993)
Untitled (Black Abstract), 1956
ink on paper
26 x 12 1/2 inches
signed and dated at lower right
#12824
Dusti Bongé (1903 - 1993)
Untitled (Black Oval), 1958
ink wash on paper
26 x 20 inches
signed at lower right
#12828
Dusti Bongé (1903 - 1993)
Untitled (Black and Gray Rectangle), 1958
ink wash on paper
26 x 19 3/4 inches
signed at lower right
#12829
Dusti Bongé (1903 - 1993)
Untitled (Green Lines on Brown Ground), 1966
tempera on papr
20 x 16 inches
signed and dated at lower right
#12830
Dusti Bongé (1903 - 1993)
Untitled, 1960
ink/watercolor on paper
26 x 20 inches
signed at lower left
#12724
Dusti Bongé (1903 - 1993)
Untitled Composition, 1987
ink/watercolor on paper
7 1/2 x 5 inches
initialed and dated at lower right
#12723