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NEUBERGER MUSEUM OF ART
American People, Black Light: Faith Ringgold's Paintings of the 1960s
Edited by Thom Collins, Tracy Fitzpatrick. Text by Michele Wallace.
Faith Ringgold (born 1930) is famed today as the progenitor of the African-American story-quilt revival of the late 1970s, but her story begins much earlier, with her American People Series of 1963. These once influential paintings, and the many political posters and murals she created throughout the 1960s, have largely disappeared from view, being routinely omitted from art historical discourse over the past 40 years. American People, Black Light is the first examination of Ringgold's earliest radical and pioneering explorations of race, gender and class. Undertaken to address the social upheavals of the 1960s, these are the works through which Ringgold found her political voice. American People, Black Light offers not only clear insight into a critical moment in American history, but also a clear account of what it meant to be an African American woman making her way as an artist at that time.
"For Members Only recalls the open racial hostility I encountered as a child on a church school outing to Tibbets Brook in Upper New York State. A band of white men, carrying sticks, surrounded us kids and demanded that we get out and 'go back to your bus'"
Faith Ringgold, excerpted from her autobiography We Flew over the Bridge and featured in American People, Black Light: Faith Ringgold's Paintings of the 1960s. Featured image, Faith Ringgold's American People Series #2: For Members Only, 1963, is reproduced from American People, Black Light: Faith Ringgold's Paintings of the 1960s.
"These works are critical to reconceptualizing our understanding of artistic production in the 1960s. It is incongruous that the art of a period defined by the Civil Rights movement and the Vietnam War, the women's movement and first-wave feminism, has become defined by rather sterile movements of pop art and minimalism, movements that generally fail to connect with the social and political circumstances of the time. Faith Ringgold's work offers not only clear insight into that important moment in the history of our country, but also insight into what it means to be an African American woman making her way as an artist at the time."
FORMAT: Pbk, 9 x 10.75 in. / 136 pg / 71 color / 23 b&w. LIST PRICE: U.S. $30.00 LIST PRICE: CANADA $35 ISBN: 9780979562938 PUBLISHER: Neuberger Museum of Art AVAILABLE: 3/31/2011 DISTRIBUTION: D.A.P. RETAILER DISC: TRADE PUBLISHING STATUS: Out of print AVAILABILITY: Not available TERRITORY: *not available
American People, Black Light: Faith Ringgold's Paintings of the 1960s
Published by Neuberger Museum of Art. Edited by Thom Collins, Tracy Fitzpatrick. Text by Michele Wallace.
Faith Ringgold (born 1930) is famed today as the progenitor of the African-American story-quilt revival of the late 1970s, but her story begins much earlier, with her American People Series of 1963. These once influential paintings, and the many political posters and murals she created throughout the 1960s, have largely disappeared from view, being routinely omitted from art historical discourse over the past 40 years. American People, Black Light is the first examination of Ringgold's earliest radical and pioneering explorations of race, gender and class. Undertaken to address the social upheavals of the 1960s, these are the works through which Ringgold found her political voice. American People, Black Light offers not only clear insight into a critical moment in American history, but also a clear account of what it meant to be an African American woman making her way as an artist at that time.
