What makes Jacob Lawrence’s artwork powerful is that it is a voice of Black people and offers a complete view of the African American experience. It goes without saying that Mr. Lawrence presents the lives of his people through highly skilled paintings and artistry, yet he is not only a painter. Because of the material and manner in which Jacob Lawrence paints, he is an activist, storyteller and philosopher. The images in just one of his paintings dare to say what most people are afraid to acknowledge, generate flashbacks and the emotions that accompany flashbacks, and make one dissect and investigate their convictions.
Jacob Lawrence was the firs African American artist to receive sustained support from mainstream art museums. Even before he was 21, Mr. Lawrence had made a name for himself as an artist who would reveal and declare the importance of the African American Experience. In 1939 his series of panels of Haitian general, Toussaint L’Overture, was shown in an exhibit of African-American artists so-sponsored by the Harmon Foundation and he Baltimore Museum of Art. (Lewis, pg. 129) Lawrence’s narrative series about the dynamic abolitionist Frederick Douglass and angelic free
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He holds onto the stick with both hands as if he is prepared to swing for dear life. Their arms are engaged and prepared to strike and battle. If Lawrence had given a full frontal view of this episode the power of his piece would have been lost. One of his hands gripping the red stick is yellow. This contrasts the White men who hold their clubs with great ease and regularity. dom fighter Harriet Tubman soon followed the panels of L’Overture. Lawrence provided work that people wanted to see and ideas that people were not familiar with. During the time period that African Americans were migrating race riots were very numerous all over the North. Lawrence is representing the unruliness of the time by the way he arranges the shapes and figure ground relationships.
Approximate Word count =
1189
Approximate Pages =
5 (250 words per page double spaced)
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