BY BILL VAV SICLEN

Providence artist Morgan Monceaux sure gets around.

Since arriving from New York City six years ago, the former homeless person, now a nationally acclaimed illustrator and folk artist, has become a fixture on the local art scene. He's helped raise money for Veterans Memorial Auditorium, organized exhibits for the Rhode Island Foundation and campaigned against crack cocaine at AS220.

All that and he's also found time to publish several books, including a collection of jazz portraits (Jazz:My Music, My People) and Wild west drawing (My Heroes, My People: African Americans and Native Americans in the West).

So it's no surprise that Monceaux's work is currently on display at three galleries around town, including one man shows at the Sol Gallery in South Providence and Center City Contemporary Arts downtown.

NEW WORKS AT SOL

If you're already familiar with Monceaux's work , your best bet is the Sol exhibit. the show marks a departure for the artist, best known for his playful mixed-media drawings of famous historical and cultural figures.

In these new works, Monceaux continues to show off his skills as a folk-portraitist, often lassoing his subjects with quickly sketched outlines, then shading in heads, hands,feet and clothing like sections of a child's coloring book. But both the medium (oil painting) and the subject matter (everyday people doing everyday things) are new.

In the Sermon, for example, an Black minister is shown preaching to his congregation. Other paintings depict a railroad conductor playing cards, a couple getting married and a hip-hop DJ scratching his turntables.

A holdover from Monceaux's earlier work is the use of bits of cloth, plastic, jewelry and other materials to embellish his paintings. A portrait of a nurse, for instance, includes a toy stethoscope and a plastic hypodermic needle.

Despite his child-like style, Monceaux is no Grandma Moses. In fact, the Sol exhibit comes with the artistic equivalent of an R rating. The warning refers to two works-a large nude self-portrait and a panoramic view of a gay leather bar-that are anatomically explicit.

Interestingly, both paintings are among the artist's best efforts.

Portraits at Centercity

At CenterCity, Monceaux is showing mixed-media drawings of Independent Spirits series. Like the earlier sreies of portraits for My Heroes, My People, this show focueses on prominent black andNative American figures from the past.