Bou Kornine

Bou Kornine is one of a very few paintings that Rigsby held from sale at his exhibits. Created in 1967, this painting includes a photo taken by the artist of Bou Kornine, a small mountain near the Gulf of Tunis in Northern Africa’s Tunisia. The artist and his family moved to Tunisia from New York City in 1966 to join a friend who invited him to, quote, “paint by the light of Klee”, a reference to artist Paul Klee whose 1914 trip to Tunisia famously transformed that artist’s work. It’s likely the photograph was taken from the shore near Carthage, where Rigsby and his family spent the winters in a rented villa.   

One of the most profound influences on David Rigsby was his mentor, Japanese artist Tatsu Heima, a visiting art professor at the University of Alabama where Rigsby studied painting and sculpture. These watercolors, titled after a style of Japanese art, are evidence that Tatsu’s influence continued long after Rigsby’s university days of the late 1950s and early 1960s.