Adrian Piper

Many of the ideas presented in her work, Blue Black Boy, are ones she has had to face in her own life. Living in America, she has been subjected to scrutiny based solely on her skin color as well as other forms of racism. Speaking of racism, Blue Black Boy, was created in a time where racism was very prevalent; every aspect of life was exposed to. These feelings by society and ___ of racism have attributed to the formal aspects mentioned above and shaped how Weems created her work of art. While there was a great deal of racism, many having been pushing for equality amongst races. Weems can be seen as one of the many pushing for equality and I see Blue Black Boy as an attempt to raise a question within society about the treatment of African

Some say she contributed a lot of important things to science. Her many honors include induction into Phi Beta Kappa as well as being tapped as a fellow of the American Association for the advancement of science. She started a scholarship in honor of her father for minority students who want to study science at Queens College. She is described as a person a happy person because of her accomplishments. She inspires african-american females to do what they put their mind to.

Postmodern American artist’s Cindy Sherman and Kara Walker critique and question grand narratives of gender, race and class through their work and art practice. Cindy Sherman, born 1954, is well renowned for her conceptual portraits of female characters and personas that question the representation of women, gender identity and the true (or untrue) nature of photography (Hattenstone 2011). Kara Walker, born 1969, is known for her black silhouettes that dance across gallery walls and most recently her sugar sphinx, A Subtlety, address America’s racist slavery past (Berry 2003). These practitioners differ in their practical application of different mediums, Sherman constructs characters and scenes of stereotypical female personas in her photographs where she operates as the actress, director, wardrobe assistant, set designer and cameraman (Machester 2001). Simone Hatenstone, writer for The Guardian, states “She 's a Hitchcock heroine, a busty Monroe, an abuse victim, a terrified centrefold, a corpse, a Caravaggio, a Botticelli, a mutilated hermaphrodite sex doll, a man in a balaclava, a surgically-enhanced Hamptons type, a cowgirl, a desperate clown, and we 've barely started.” (Hattenstone 2011).Whereas, Walker creates paper silhouettes that are installed into a gallery space, as writer Ian Berry describes,

Kehinde Wiley’s early works were of people he pulled off the streets of Harlem. His art blurs the boundaries between traditional and contemporary modes of representation and the critical portrayal of the masculinity of black and brown men. Generally, western art has and does not focus on the narratives of people

Systematic racism continues to perpetuate the marginalization of people of color in the 21st century despite belief of living in a post racial society. This unfortunate reality is seen in many different forms of current culture. One of the ways systematic racism takes current form, is in the negative portrayal created by a single narrative, or the lack thereof, minority groups. This lack of representation or diversity of people of color in different forms of art and platforms, not only affects those subject to misrepresentation, but perpetuates negative attitudes and discriminatory behavior towards those subject to misrepresentation. It is necessary to look into the ways this single narrative in different art forms affects marginalized group, and the current move to dismantle the component power plays in who gets to tell these stories.

In 1980 she graduated from Brown University with an honorary degree she began her career as a labor organizer that organize low workers in janitorial industries. She went across the country, organizing garment workers in south Texas, hotel workers in New Orleans, and janitors in Los Angeles In 1985 she became a leader for Justice for Janitor. As a leader she fought for every know week worker to

In 2010 former President Obama awarded her with Presidential medal of freedom. She was a poet, singer, memoirist, and civil rights activist. She published seven autobiographies “I know why the caged birds sing, Gather

Hurston uses imagery to assert that her culture is worth celebrating, which supports Steele’s concepts of stereotypes and identity contingencies. In the first chapter of Steele’s book Whistling Vivaldi; he uses an excerpt from New York Times writer Brent Staples’ article to represent a real life example of a stereotype threat, “I became an expert in the language of fear. Couples locked arms or reached for each other’s hand when they saw me. I’d been a fool. I’d been walking the streets grinning good evening at people who were frightened to death of me. I did violence to them just by being…I began to avoid people…Out of nervousness I began to whistle and discovered I was good at it. On the street at night I whistled popular tunes from the Beatles

With recruiting black women into the legal profession, she had a big say in the federal government. In 1995, she was part of the delegation with the lawyers committee for civil rights. Along with being general counsel, she also worked for the Aeronautics Space Administration (NASA). She had a substantial impact in the federal agency, spending 10 years there. In total, she has a total of over 40 years in the legal profession.

She received first prize at the American Negro Exposition in Chicago during 1940 for her Mother and Child sculpture. She also received the Distinguished Alumni Award from the University of Iowa in 1996, an Image Award from the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People in 2009, and has a honorary day in Cleveland and week at Berkeley for her fights for social justice (citation). She has been called the “foremost African American woman artist of her generation” by Melanie Herzog, an art historian (Elizabeth Catlett

Her career as writer probably would have lasted longer, but she was accused of plagiarizing her short story, "Sanctuary." She was eventually cleared of any wrong doing, but the accusation deeply tarnished her reputation as writer. It is truly a shame that the first African-American woman to win the Guggenheim Fellowship was forced out of writing by scandal. Before being haunted by scandal,

"...Our problem is to conceive, develop, establish an art era. Not white art painting black...let 's bare our arms and plunge them deep through laughter, through pain, through sorrow, through hope, through disappointment, into the very depths of the souls of our people and drag forth material crude, rough, neglected. Then let 's sing it, dance it, write it, paint it. Let 's do the impossible. Let 's create something transcendentally material, mystically objective. Earthy. Spiritually earthy. Dynamic." - Aaron Douglas.During the time of the harlem renaissance Aaron Douglas used his artwork to take pride in his african american culture. All of his artwork conveyed one common message and that was the role that African Americans played in society. All of this was seen in one of his major artworks which was the “Aspects of Negro Life,” mural on the 135th Street branch of the New York Public Library.

Centuries passed and the United States’ view of African American evolved, however traces of the country’s racists minstrel past continues to linger in contemporary popular culture as black bodies and black culture are exploited for profit in areas ranging from food adverts with the Mammy character, to the appropriation and reclamation of rap and hip-hop by white artists. In reaction to the portrayal of black Americans in these minstrel shows, black performers would later utilize blackface to hide behind a caricature while protesting and mocking the powerful without the fear of retaliation, safely questioning authority while simultaneously insisting to be acting out authentic African American expressions (Saunders).

Art is something that can only be achieved with the manipulation of the imagination. This is successful when using objects, sounds, and words. Richard Wright and Amira Baraka brought the power of art into the limelight. Wright’s perception of art was for it to be used as a means of guidance, one that could uplift the Negro towards bigger and better goals. Baraka’s perspective of art was for it to be used as an active agent, one that could kill and then imprint society permanently. Baraka and Wright both wanted the Negro to see that there was a much brighter future ahead of them. Both wanted art to leave a stain, a stain that could not be easily erased, washed, or bleached. Both believed that Black Art had no need to be silent but instead daring.

Anderson was interested in the development of the artist- type, the inner desires of repressed people, the failure of people to communicate their true selves; the way conventions and tradition have twisted and distorted the individual (Doneskey 1-3).