Elizabeth Catlett, Mexican and American, 1915 - 2012 Search this
Medium:
ink and graphite on paper
Dimensions:
H x W (image with title): 6 5/8 × 9 in. (16.8 × 22.9 cm)
H x W (image): 6 1/16 × 9 1/16 in. (15.4 × 23 cm)
H x W (sheet): 11 1/4 × 15 1/16 in. (28.6 × 38.3 cm)
Type:
linocuts
Date:
1947; printed 1989
Caption:
I wanted to show the history and strength of all kinds of Black women. Working women, country women, great women in the history of the United States. — Elizabeth Catlett
Elizabeth Catlett was a versatile sculptor and printmaker committed to making art that promoted women, family, community, and equality. In 1946, she received a Julius Rosenwald Foundation Grant to travel and study in Mexico City. There, she worked with the Taller de Gráphica Popular (People’s Graphic Arts Workshop), a printmaking collective primarily dedicated to the production of sociopolitical art. During her stay, she completed The Negro Woman. This narrative series of prints embodies a first-person perspective of Black women, imparting a sense of intimacy and resilience as the viewer navigates a variety of images relating to resilience, heroism, and the ongoing struggle for racial justice.
Description:
Black and white linocut of an unidentified group of workers. The group consists of four men with one woman who is standing in the center. She has one arm raised in a fist above her head. Two men are facing the woman with their backs visible. The man on the left is holding a flier which reads [JOIN] at the top. The man to the right, wearing a flat cap, is resting a hand on another man's shoulder. The man in the back left, also wearing a flat cap, is looking to the right and has one arm raised. On the right in the background is a building with two smokestacks. The title is handwritten in graphite below the image and the work is signed. The reverse is blank.
