03:17
Faizan
David Pilgrim, founder and curator of the new Jim Crow Museum of Racist Memorabilia, at Ferris University in Michigan describes an incident he experience while in college that affected his life.
"I went to a historically black college, Jarvis Christian College in Texas and in addition to teaching the usual math and science, our professors would tell us stories of Jim Crow. One day, one of my professors came into the classroom with a chauffeur's cap. He set the hat down and asked what historical significance it had.
Now, the obvious answer was that blacks were denied many opportunities, and chauffeuring was one of the few jobs open to them. But that was not the right answer. He told us that a lot of professional middle-class blacks in those days always traveled with a chauffeur's hat. The reason: If they were driving a nice new car through a small southern town, they didn't want police officers, or any other whites, to know the car belonged to them."
So began his collection of racial symbolism that grew in size to form the foundation of a new type of museum.
Just as David Pilgrim, so Kara Walker is also an African-American deeply committed to exploring racial symbolism. As a young and talented sculptor, she describes her work as exploring race, gender, sexuality, violence and identity in her work. At the age of 27 she became the second youngest recipient of the coveted John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation's "genius" grant.
In May of last year (2014), Walker debuted her first sculpture, a monumental piece entitled, A Subtlety, or the Marvelous Sugar Baby, an Homage to the unpaid and overworked Artisans who have refined our Sweet tastes from the cane fields to the Kitchens of the New World on the Occasion of the demolition of the Domino Sugar Refining Plant. Sited in the sprawling industrial complexes of Brooklyn's legendary Domino Sugar factory, at 75-ft long and 35-ft high and 26-ft wide, it's a mammoth critique on the detestable and dehumanizing history of slavery.
The work is mostly made out of sugar and comprises a series of figures, including 15 servants bearing empty baskets and bananas. These boyish slaves are moving towards a giantess at the center of the piece, naked except for a Black Mammie (think Aunt Jemima) headscarf. Her sphinx-like physique is an exaggerated feminine look. "I was thinking about sugar and the associations with desire," explains the artist.
Walker is far from shy about delving into controversial topics in her art. In 1999, the Detroit Institute of Art removed one of her pieces, The Means to an End: Shadow Drama in Five Acts when African-American artists objected to its presence. Another Walker piece, entitled, The moral arc of history ideally bends towards justice but just as soon as not curves back around toward barbarism, sadism, and unrestrained chaos, caused so much controversy among the trustees employees at the Newark, New Jersey Public Library, that the library was forced to cover it
"I went to a historically black college, Jarvis Christian College in Texas and in addition to teaching the usual math and science, our professors would tell us stories of Jim Crow. One day, one of my professors came into the classroom with a chauffeur's cap. He set the hat down and asked what historical significance it had.
Now, the obvious answer was that blacks were denied many opportunities, and chauffeuring was one of the few jobs open to them. But that was not the right answer. He told us that a lot of professional middle-class blacks in those days always traveled with a chauffeur's hat. The reason: If they were driving a nice new car through a small southern town, they didn't want police officers, or any other whites, to know the car belonged to them."
So began his collection of racial symbolism that grew in size to form the foundation of a new type of museum.
Just as David Pilgrim, so Kara Walker is also an African-American deeply committed to exploring racial symbolism. As a young and talented sculptor, she describes her work as exploring race, gender, sexuality, violence and identity in her work. At the age of 27 she became the second youngest recipient of the coveted John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation's "genius" grant.
In May of last year (2014), Walker debuted her first sculpture, a monumental piece entitled, A Subtlety, or the Marvelous Sugar Baby, an Homage to the unpaid and overworked Artisans who have refined our Sweet tastes from the cane fields to the Kitchens of the New World on the Occasion of the demolition of the Domino Sugar Refining Plant. Sited in the sprawling industrial complexes of Brooklyn's legendary Domino Sugar factory, at 75-ft long and 35-ft high and 26-ft wide, it's a mammoth critique on the detestable and dehumanizing history of slavery.
The work is mostly made out of sugar and comprises a series of figures, including 15 servants bearing empty baskets and bananas. These boyish slaves are moving towards a giantess at the center of the piece, naked except for a Black Mammie (think Aunt Jemima) headscarf. Her sphinx-like physique is an exaggerated feminine look. "I was thinking about sugar and the associations with desire," explains the artist.
Walker is far from shy about delving into controversial topics in her art. In 1999, the Detroit Institute of Art removed one of her pieces, The Means to an End: Shadow Drama in Five Acts when African-American artists objected to its presence. Another Walker piece, entitled, The moral arc of history ideally bends towards justice but just as soon as not curves back around toward barbarism, sadism, and unrestrained chaos, caused so much controversy among the trustees employees at the Newark, New Jersey Public Library, that the library was forced to cover it
Posted in: arts
