Born in Chicago, Charles White was a painter, printmaker, muralist, and educator known for his stylistic approach to Black subjects. Youth is a lithograph portrait of a young man looking into a far-off distance. Cross-hatching contrasts shadow and light across the young man’s face.
David Driskell was a Black artist, scholar, and curator known for his culmination of African abstract forms and modern aesthetics from Eatonton, GA. Young Pines Growing is an abstraction of a pine tree against a light blue background. The dispersed tree displays a texture similar to stained-glass using dimensional greens.
William Artis was a sculptor from Washington, NC. Young Mother is a ceramic sculpture of a hooded woman looking off into the distance away from the viewer.
John T. Biggers was an educator, painter, and muralist from Gastonia, NC. Young Mother depicts a woman breastfeeding her baby. The seated woman is wearing a nightgown and kerchief while caring for the baby. The baby wears a onesie as he feeds from his mother. Various people are outside the windows of the wooden homes.
Elizabeth Catlett was an artist and educator from Washington, D.C., who repatriated to Mexico. Young Girl is a Terra-Cotta bust of a Black female. It shows Catlett's sculptural skill with sharp details from the subject's hair texture to her expression.
Shelia Pree Bright is a cultural anthropologist and photographer from Waycross, GA. Young Americans Series: Tarrynn Deavens, age 18, African American depicts a young Black woman posing with the American flag binding her arms and mouth. This series is an examination of Generation Y's response to America.
Benjamin Britt was a figurative, surrealist, abstract painter and art teacher from Winfall, NC. Yield Not depicts the debilitating nature of mental health issues and their impact on human perception and potential. The subject is cowering with his head in his lap as he reaches toward a small pink ball that he perceives as out of his reach.
William Artis was a sculptor from Washington, NC. Woman with Kerchief is a terracotta sculpture of a Black woman with her head covered by a tied kerchief.
Frank Neal was a painter who studied in Mexico and at The Art Institute of Chicago. Woman in White is a portrait painting of a Black woman in all-white attire holding an umbrella with a white and gold handle. She is depicted as high-class in a bright yellow room with two chairs, a white picture frame, and a marble table in the background.
Henry Wilmer Bannarn was an educator, sculptor, painter, and sketch artist best known for his work during the Harlem Renaissance. Winter Sports is an oil painting of seven figures in a frozen pond below a town on a hill. Four figures are skating, two are sitting near the lake, and one is watching from a short distance.
Julia Ann Fields was an artist from Lawrence, KS. Winter Feeling illustrates a residential area after a snowfall. The painting depicts a green-roofed house with a shed and wheelbarrow. In the background are three other homes in various colors and barren trees.
June Hector was an artist from Atlanta, GA. Wild Flowers displays a landscape of flowers in multiple colors and plant organisms all surrounding a small body of water. The colors blue, red, yellow, and purple are layered throughout the painting.
James Watkins was an artist from Akron, OH. Widow Woman is a portrait of an elderly Black woman wearing a long white dress, a light blue shawl, a pink headwrap, and small golden earrings. She looks straight ahead in solitude, her hands folded over one another.
William Artis was a sculptor from Washington, NC. We Have Seen His Face is a ceramic bust of a hooded woman with her head raised. The subject holds a reverent expression as she looks toward God.
Frederick D. Jones, Jr., was a mid-twentieth-century artist from South Carolina. Wash Day is an impressionistic painting depicting a Black woman doing laundry. In the piece, a robed woman with a laundry bag on her head is washing linens outside in a neighborhood. In the background, a house and two trees are visible.
Lois Mailou Jones was an artist and art educator known for her costumes, textile designs, watercolors, paintings, and collages from Washington, D.C. Voodoo Worshippers, Haiti, is a watercolor scene of three Haitian Voodoo practitioners around four candles under a full moon. Jones places colorful shapes behind black brushstrokes that create depth.
Lois Mailou Jones was an artist and art educator from Washington, D.C., known for her costumes, textile designs, watercolors, paintings, and collages. Ville d'Houdain, France, is a landscape painting depicting a community in the Pas-de-Calais department in the Hauts-de-France region.
Hayward Oubre was a multimedia artist and educator from New Orleans, LA. Verily, I Say Unto You depicts a modern portrait of a Black Jesus. Jesus is drawn with an elongated nose with wide nostrils, large eyes, pursed lips, locs, and a raised finger.
Walter Augustus Simon was an art historian, professor, and artist best known for his abstract oil paintings from Petersburg, VA. Venezia is a cubist landscape abstraction depicting San Marco, Venice, ITL. Simon uses a variety of shapes and colors to illustrate Venice’s main public square.
William H. Johnson was a painter from Florence, SC. Untitled Folk Scene depicts a couple doing a wide variety of dances within the Southern Jazz tradition. In this iteration of the series, a dapper man dips an equally stylish woman as instruments play around them.
Skunder Boghossian was an artist from Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. Untitled depicts a spiritual scene of four masquerade figures hanging from a central pole. The four masquerades each wear different masks and wear beads, shells, and bands of color patterns.
Freddie Styles was an abstract painter and collage artist from Madison, Georgia. Untitled is an ink painting of three women with elongated necks, curled hair, and black-painted skin. Their faces are partially concealed as they stare straight ahead. Their torsos are white, with exposed breasts outlined in black ink.
Alexander S. McMath was a painter and educator from Clinton, SC. Untitled depicts a surrealist anatomical rendering of a human figure's side profile. Signed text by the artist sits on the right of the figure.
William C. Henderson II was an artist from Pontiac, MI. Union is a geometric drawing that interrogrates the intersection of lines and shapes. The piece centers a split circle, one side consisting of lines, the other of shapes, with two intersecting squares overlayed over it.
Charles White was a painter, printmaker, muralist, and educator known for his stylistic approach to African American subjects from Chicago, IL Two Alone is a painting of a man embracing a woman as they stand in front of a window. The woman stands, arms crossed, leaning into the man who looks into the distance and above her head.
Dr. Eddie Jack Jordan, Sr. was a Southern artist from Wichita Falls, TX. Twin Fetish is a wooden sculpture of twins made from upcycled materials. This readymade art piece uses pieces of furniture to depict two twin siblings.
Edward L. Loper was an artist and teacher from Delaware known for his vibrant palette and juxtaposition of colors. Twelfth Street Gardens is a landscape piece illustrating a rural town under a slightly cloudy, blue sky during Autumn. The piece shows three men conversing beside a field in a rural residential area.
Samella Sanders Lewis was a printmaker, painter, sculptor, and art historian from New Orleans, LA. Trapper's Rest depicts a fishing pier at night. Two boats, fishing equipment, and a pier lodge, which fishermen often use for rest and storage, are positioned alongside the pier.
Charles W. Stallings was a painter, printmaker, sculptor, and educator from Gary, IN. Tragic Figure is a sculpture of a gender-ambiguous person standing on a pedestal. The subject adopts a demure pose as it stares over its shoulders toward the viewer.
