African American Painting
African American painting is a rich part of the continent’s culture, mostly exuding the endurance and hardships of the blacks in those trying times. The paintings speak volumes about the horrendous days, when the Africans Americans had to fight many odds to rise above oppression and racial discrimination.
Discussing in details the African American Painting
Creating art is not an easy task and those who are involved in this enduring task, have to strive hard to carve a niche. This is more a difficult task for the African American, since black skins are deprived of most of the privileges. However, to your surprise the list incorporating the names of the African American artists is quite an impressive one.
Most of the African American artists have used African themes in their art. You can say that the most of the paintings are the true mirror of those hard times. Depending upon the nature and background of the African American history, their painting is often dark with elements of violence and anger. One such instance is the renowned painter Malvin Johnson whose paintings deal with the Harlem street life.
However, there are other painters whose art depicts the other shades of the African history. You can say that most of the paintings have African influence, which have often employed the Avant garde styles, such as Abstraction, mixed media collage and synthetic cubism. Historic African American figures have played a dominating role in the realm of African American painting. One such artist is Jacob Lawrence, who devoted most of his career in exploring the lives of American heroes.
Pippin is a name of pride in the history of African American painting. His work is more warm, folksy, simple and optimistic. Whereas, Lois Mailou Jones’ work, somewhat exudes the look of upbeat pop art. Claude Clark born in 1945 grew up to be a famous painter. He started taking interest in painting immensely and soon painted pictures revolving around themes of struggle for African Americans.
However, Africans believe that, the most popular painter in the African history is Jacob Lawrence. His focus was mainly on themes of slavery and racial oppression. He first caught the eyes of the nation, for his exhibition of The Migration of the Negro. It was the peak of his career and almost 60 of his paintings got sold in the market.
His paintings narrated the despair and endurance of the Negroes right from the beginning and how they were tortured in the plantation fields for the whites. The whole series of the 60 paintings begin and end from the railroad station. Interestingly, the paintings explain the reasons why the African Americans felt the urge to move northwards due to insufferable poverty and torments.
The north picture shown in the African American painting depicts those hard times and how the Negroes were used in the industries and in the tough living condition. Lawrence’s African American painting of the south also depicts the same tortures with a different scenario.
Hence, it can be concluded that, the African American painting is part of the rich history and culture of the African Americans, since they epitomize those dark days and the other stories of the African history.
