Collage of various printed papers on thick masonite board, circa 1967. 292x216 mm; 11 1/2x8 1/2 inches. Signed in ink, lower right.
Provenance: the artist; ACA Gallery, New York, with the labels on the frame back; private collection, New York.
This wonderful collage is one of the three known works by Romare Bearden of this significant and early subject. There is the larger Melon Season, 1967, 56x44 inches, in the collection of the Neuberger Museum, SUNY at Purchase, NY, and a smaller untitled collage, the same size as Melon Time, which was sold at Swann Galleries on March 7, 2006. Both of these collages were included in the 2012 exhibition Romare Bearden: Southern Recollections at the Mint Museum, Charlotte, NC.
