Jacob Lawrence : An African American Painter Essay

Henry Ossawa Tanner is an African-American artist. His works often subvert racial stereotypes and display his experiences as an African-American. The Annunciation (1898) depicts a traditional biblical scene in a modern manner; the painting portrays the well-known scene of Gabriel appearing before Mary to deliver news that she is to be the mother of Christ, however instead of merely accepting this fate she seems to be reluctant. Tanner takes a common biblical subject matter and attempts to paint the scene in a historically and “archaeologically accurate” way. His work features Mary as a young Palestinian rather than the usual idealized Anglo-Saxon woman. Tanner humanizes Mary and adds a touch of realism through his style and subject, subverting the allegorical qualities of the familiar biblical scene. He works to highlight realistic human aspects and expressions and modernizes well-known and frequently depicted biblical scenes. His disposition to do so stems from his experiences as an African American and as an African American artist.

William H. Johnson was a successful painter who was born on March 18, 1901 in Florence, South Carolina. Johnson began exploring his level of creativity as a child, and it only amplified from there because he discovered that he wanted to be an artist. After making this discovery he attended the National Academy of Design in New York which is where he met his mentor Charles Webster Hawthorne who had a strong influential impact on Johnson. Once Johnson graduated he moved to Paris where he was exposed to different artists, various artistic abilities, and evolutionary creations. Throughout Johnson’s time in Paris he grew as an artist, and adapted a “folk” style where he used lively colors and flat figures. Johnson used the “folk” style to express the experience of most African-Americans during the years of the 1930s and 1940s.

Black No More and “The Negro Art Hokum” give important insight into how George Schulyer views race and identity, the importance of essences, and his stance on racial anti-essentialism. Black No More does clearly challenge Schulyer’s ideas in his essay that race in the way it is construed in the U.S. is not a meaningful essential part of who a person is because although our main protagonist Max Disher was able to be white in appearance thus being able to fit into white society, in essence he was still a black man and found his social kinship with members of Harlem’s black community. Essence makes a person who they are in conjunction with their physical racial attributes. In some cases who a character is on the inside does not always match up with their outward appearance, as in Black No More with Disher’s white skin and his black mentality.

The Chicano art movement rose during the civil rights era was based on three goals that included restoral of land, education reforms rights for farm workers. The three goals followed by the Chicano Art artists had long been coming. One of the first goals included rights for farm workers. Arguably, the Mexicans Americans fight to secure unionization for the farm workers was one of the key goals of the Chicano art. In order to Sway the grape farmers, Cesar Chavez launched a national boycott that aimed at the American Farm

Harlem Renaissance was undoubtedly a cultural and social-political movement for the African American race. The Renaissance was many things to people, but it is best described as a cultural movement in which the high level of black artistic cultural production, demanded and received recognition. Many African American writers, musicians, poets, and leaders were able to express their creativity in many ways in response to their social condition. Until the Harlem Renaissance, poetry and literature were dominated by the white people and were all about the white culture. One writer in particular, Langston Hughes, broke through those barriers that very few African-American artists had done before this

One the most distinguished artists of the twentieth century, Jacob Lawrence was born in Atlantic City and spnt part of his child hood in Pennsylvania. After his parents split up in 1924, he went with his mother and siblings to New York, settling in Harlem. "He trained as a painter at the Harlem Art Workshop, inside the New York Public Library's 113 5th Street branch. Younger than the artists and writers who took part in the Harlem Renaissance of the 1920s, Lawrence was also at an angle to them: he was not interested in the kind of idealized, fake-primitive images of blacks - the Noble Negroes in Art Deco guise - that tended to be produced as an antidote to the toxic racist stereotypes with which white popular culture had flooded

In our era today, as you proceed through life, there is discrimination against races. As much as we would like to witness things change for the better we won’t due to some people not taking the chance to rewire their hatred. But in the early 1900’s, some black middle-class families immigrated to Harlem, New York, which at the time was an upper-class white neighborhood. The White’s tried to kick the African Americans out, but ultimately failed. In 1910-1930 African Americans in Harlem have changed what the city was like back then, now it is known for its African American culture. They also created a period called the Harlem Renaissance that is considered a golden age in African American culture. This was a time when they had an artistic explosion,

Lawrence himself was raised in New York after his parents moved there from South Carolina, which personally tied him to The Great Migration as his parents were part of the movement. While a young man in New York Lawrence fell in love with art produced by the Harlem Renaissance and began studying African art at the 135th Street Public Library, where he then became interested in the history behind Harlem and The Great Migration. After extensive research on the topic Lawrence learned of the depths of Southern racism as well as the hardships the migrants faced during their lives and “by drawing upon his emotional responses to them” he began planning The Migration of the Negro (The Phillips Collection 1). Once started the series became the center of Lawrence's focus and all his time poured into the project as Lawrence was devoted to his “ethnic pride and his desire to reveal events” that took place in so many African-Americans lives including his own parents (The Phillips Collection 1). Through these panels he was able to illustrate the corrupt social climate that resulted in the suffering of countless migrants. For example in Panel 22, named “Another of the social causes of the migrants’ leaving was that at times they did not feel safe,

She was hoping that her son would get involved in civil service. Jacobs’s career in painting was encouraged by members of the creative community such as poet Claude McKay and sculptor Augusta Savage. When Jacob graduated in 1939, he received funds from Works Progress Administration Federal Act project. At the age of twenty-one Lawrence had his first solo exhibition at the Harlem YMCA when he was working in easel painting. Jacob Lawrence best work was Migration of the Negro or simply The Migration Series in 1941 and the series was in an exhibit at the Edith Halpert’s downtown gallery in 1942. Which made Lawrence the first African-American to join this gallery. When world war two started Lawrence was drafted in the U.S. Coast Guard. During Lawrence stint in the military he was stationed in Florida and Massachusetts. During this time Jacob produced forty-eight painting all which have been lost. When Jacob Lawrence finished his tour on active duty he received a Guggenheim Fellowship and painted his war series. After his time in the military Lawrence was giving a chance to teach at Black Mountain College by Albers. Albers hired a private train car so that it could transport Jacob and his wife to the college, so that when the couple crossed the Mason-Dixon Line that they would not have to transfer to the colored

The 1920s were a time of great prosperity and revitalization. This decade gave way to many great social milestones for every class of people. From the limits for immigration to the boom of the auto industry American society was drastically altered. Issues such as foreign immigration,prohibition, the Ku Klux Klan ,evolution, women’s roles, and race were the focus of the populus and drove politics within the nation. Art played a major role in how the black community expressed their new found sense of culture. Painting has always been a way for someone to portrait their ideas.

during this time he quickly became a part of the Harlem Renaissance. Four years later,

During the late 19th and 20th centuries Blacks in America were debating on the proper way to define and present the Negro to America. Leaders such as Alain Lock, W.E.B. Dubois, Marcus Garvey, and Tuskegee University founder Booker T. Washington all had ideas of a New Negros who was intellectually smart, politically astute, and contributors to society in trade work. All four influential leaders wrote essays to this point of the new Negro and their representations in art and life. In “Art or Propaganda”, Locke pleas not for corrupt or overly cultured art but for art free to serve its own ends, free to choose either "group expression" or "individualistic expression.” (National Humanities Center) In W.E.B. Du Bois speech "Criteria for Negro

African Art does not have specific date to which it evolved because most early African Art was carved in wood, which perished quickly. This is why most art dates from the 19th and early 20th century. Many 20th century artists admired and collected pieces of African Art. They enjoyed the bold color, expression, and form that produced a new beginning in art history. African Art was mostly dedicated to life affirming activities such as healing, pleasure, protection, and transformation.

Lawrence made paintings based on the theme of builders. These works present a limited palette of primary colors, black, and white and human activity is juxtaposed against architectural elements, building tools, and materials. They communicate Lawrence’s ideas about American worker culture, including female workers, and expanding the idea of the builder to include the family. These works also symbolically reflect increased African-American participation in the building trades during the 1940s and late

James Joyce created all of his literary pieces from his own personal experiences throughout his life and the culture he grew up in (Norris 3). In his novel, A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, Joyce and his character, Stephen Dedalus, share a wide variety of similarities, all the way from childhood aspects, to challenges of adulthood. Because of these similarities, A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, is considered an autobiography. James Joyce created the character, Stephen Dedalus, as a mirrored image of himself in both A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man and Ulysses. However, A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man describes Joyce’s own experiences from boyhood to adulthood (Azizmohammadi 162).