Comparing Emory Douglas's 1969 All Power To The People

despite mass uprisings by blacks in resistance to unrelenting violence and the law’s delay, despite tacit urgings by blacks to be afforded some means to survive, despite bold attempts to live separate lives in America […] blacks, in the main, found themselves denied of every possible avenue to either establish their own socioeconomic independence or participate fully in larger society (“Panther”).

The Black Arts movement refers to a period of “furious flowering” of African American creativity beginning in the mid-1960’s and continuing through much of the 1970’s (Perceptions of Black). Linked both chronologically and ideologically with the Black Power Movement, The BAM recognized the idea of two cultural Americas: one black and one white. The BAM pressed for the creation of a distinctive Black Aesthetic in which black artists created for black audiences. The movement saw artistic production as the key to revising Black American’s perceptions of themselves, thus the Black Aesthetic was believed to be an integral component of the economic, political, and cultural empowerment of the Black

Meta Warrick Fuller’s sculpture “Ethiopia Awakening” served as a metaphoric yearning for African culture, a symbolic image of emancipation, an awakening of African Americans diaspora identity, resurgence of Fuller’s artistic career and as a self-portrait of Fuller. The Progressive era, from 1890 to 1920, forms the backdrop to Fuller’s life and art. This period has come to symbolize the reform efforts of the middle class. White middle class progressives sought to reengineer industry and government, pushed for economic and social reforms. The Progressive era was also a time of intense contradictions and ambiguities. Race was the blind spot of white progressives. 1 At the turn of the twentieth-century African Americans

Jim Lawson is a civil rights leader who has had his story illustrated in a three volume hardcover graphic novel called March. It was written by Jim Lawson and Andrew Aydin, with art by Nate Powell. It was produced by Top Shelf Productions in 2015. This story covers the highs and lows of Lewis’ journey towards equality. Many of his influences are documented including; his childhood, a trip to New York, nonviolence workshops, lunch counter segregation, and the “Big Six”. It’s a powerful story that through its art, may capture the attention of those who frown upon traditional literary books.

Dawning the year of 1895, the future of Black America finally rested in the hands of the very people to whom it concerned, the black community. Two popular philosophies were presented, and the argument between Booker T. Washington and W.E.B. Dubois began. These two advocated for very different means of acquiring equality, Washington promotes the economic survival of the masses while Dubois promoted the superior intelligence of the few. The struggle between representing the masses and isolating the few proved to be the deciding factor when determining which philosophy was capable of supporting the desired future of Black America. A future where the economic foundation of the masses proved to be the key to promoting equality among white and black America.

The struggle for equality and the battle to have one’s suppressed voice be heard is prevalent throughout the history of the United States. The Native Americans, women, and even Catholics have all encountered discrimination and belittlement in one shape or form, which eventually urged individuals within those groups to rise up and demand equal opportunity. As the United States began to shift away from slavery, one of the most deep rooted, controversial dilemmas aroused- what do black people need to do in order to gain civil rights both economically and socially? Booker T. Washington’s “Atlanta Exposition Address” and W.E.B. Du Bois's “The Soul of Black Folks” were pieces of writings influenced by the puzzle that black people were left to solve. Booker T. Washington and W.E.B Du Bois had contrasting ideas, but they both contributed a piece to the puzzle in hopes of solving the never ending mind game.

The intersection of social movements and Art is one that can be observed throughout the civil right movements of America in the 1960’s and early 1970’s. The sixties in America saw a substantial cultural and social change through activism against the Vietnam war, women’s right and against the segregation of the African - American communities. Art became a prominent method of activism to advocate the civil rights movement. It was a way to express self-identity as well as the struggle that people went through and by means of visual imagery a way to show political ideals and forms of resistance. To examine how a specific movement can have a profound effects on the visual art, this essay will focus on the black art movement of the 1960s and

Two of the most influential people in shaping the social and political agenda of African Americans were Booker T. Washington and W.E.B. Dubois, both early twentieth century writers. While many of their goals were the same, the two men approached the problems facing African Americans in very different ways. This page is designed to show how these two distinct thinkers and writers shaped one movement, as well as political debate for years afterward.

Martin Luther King Jr., the leader of the Civil Rights Movement, was arrested and placed in Birmingham jail after leading a non-violent march to protest racism in the streets of Alabama- a highly segregated state at the time. There he received a newspaper containing “A Call for Unity,” which was written by eight white Alabama clergymen criticizing King and his movement’s methods; this prompted King to write a letter in response to the critics. Martin Luther King Jr. employs ethos, pathos, and logos to persuade and demonstrate to the critics and other readers the many injustices of segregation.

African Americans are no stranger to discrimination. Children across American are taught about the horrific times of slavery. Following slavery, we learn about the discrimination African Americans face in the light of their bittersweet freedom. Due to this unstability, many amazing young African American artist emerged with breathtaking stories to reveal; the stories weren’t easy to expose because publishing companies and the alike were very

All of them shared a unified desire to shed the image of servitude and inferiority of the "Old Negro" and achieve a new image of pride and dignity for the revamped “New Negro”.

Douglas uses Fanon’s ideas on the importance of collective national consciousness and solidifies African American culture through his heroic images of it and mocking images of the values of White supremacy and capitalism. Douglas also emphasizes Fanon’s principle on advocating armed self-defense and revolutionary violence against the oppressors by including gun imagery. Douglas moves beyond the pacifist civil rights proclamations of Martin Luther King, Jr. and mobilizes agency Black hands, deterring state violence and healed the battered Black psyche, victimized from years of White Racist

Du Bois and his NAACP colleague James Weldon Johnson asserted that the only uniquely “American” expressive traditions in the United States had been developed by African Americans. They, more than any other group, had been forced to remake themselves in the New World, Du Bois and Johnson argued, while whites continued to look to Europe or sacrificed artistic values to commercial ones. (Native American cultures, on the other hand, seemed to be “dying out,” they claimed.) African Americans’ centuries-long struggle for freedom had made them the prophets of democracy and the artistic vanguard of American culture.

Whaley deconstructs the comic art world from 1930 to the present by questioning writers’, illustrators’, and readers’ engagement of the mutual fabrication of the black female body and the (mis)representation of black women in sequential art. She challenges how “Blackness” is produced and the absence concerning Black female characters in mainstream comics, “comic book writers have used illustrations of and ideologies about the Black female body to signify the fetish, fear, and fabrication of Africa” (p. 96). Further, she debunks the White male inventions of “Blackness” and constructs an argument why sequential art is a feasible form of understanding the visual narrative that reflects popular literature, identity politics, history, and cultural production from women of African descent. In

In 2006, Angus Taylor, a South African sculptor, created a giant carbon steel statue of a naked black man (Froud, 2011). The artwork was named ‘Positive’ (Fig 1). The origin and meaning behind this name will be revealed further on in the essay. The statue caused varied reactions in three different locations, namely on the campus of the University of Potchefstroom, in front of a Strand apartment block and finally a farm in the middle of the Karoo. There were some harsh reactions towards the artwork from sections of the White community and some of the Black community. These reactions led to issues regarding the right to freedom of expression from the artist and the public.