Ralph Ellison Invisible Man

Before writing Invisible Man, Ralph Ellison moved to New York in the summer of 1936 to pursue his passion for art and music. Following his move to New York, Ellison was introduced to Harlem artists, Richmond Barthé and Romare Bearden. Under the instruction of Barthé and the friendship of Bearden, Ellison created a visual art philosophy of his own—a belief that people’s interactions with the display and meaning of art convey their inner thoughts (Hill). Also, after becoming close friends with Richard Wright, Ellison gained a newfound interest in prose. Ellison decided to follow writing as a profession after several letters to Wright, because of a desire to display his new philosophy in words. He was dedicated to creating a literary style that

(Hill). Additionally, Ellison depicts the offices as museums that display portraits and historical objects. When the Narrator is called to Bledsoe’s office he notices the “framed portrait photographs and relief plaques of presidents and industrialists, men of power—fixed like trophies or heraldic emblems on the walls” (Ellison 137). The objects on the wall in Bledsoe’s office transform the room into a museum, however the Narrator does not yet understand that. Shelden Annis describes museums in terms of physical and social space, and the Narrator does not understand the social space of Bledsoe’s museum. The Narrator’s comments about the framed portrait photographs reveals that he has the capability to interpret the importance of the men depicted in them. For example, by revealing no uncertainty in the purpose of the portraits in the room, the Narrator fails to see the social space of the art. The Narrator fails to recognize that the portraits represent Bledsoe’s conformity to the men who overpower his actions, but succeeds in identifying the people depicted as “men of

Bates and Emerson to the museum at his own college. First, the narrator recognizes that Emerson’s office is “like a museum” (180). Additionally, by claiming that “there was nothing like this at the college museum,” the Narrator establishes that he understands the physical and social space of Emerson’s office. The Narrator notices that his college museum commonly had objects like “a set of ankle-irons… an ugly ebony African god… and a leather whip” and that the office contains many things involved with African American art (Hill). African American art is vital aspect of identity and it is being clouded by the objects of a time period consumed by brutal oppression. The terrible knowledge of slavery doesn't allow the narrator to understand any of the art displayed in Emerson's office.
The Narrator continues to live in the naïve mindset that his identity is only definable if he becomes a traditional figure of power like those he sees in the portraits of Mr. Bates's and Dr. Bledsoe's offices. In Mr. Bates's office the narrator admires "three portraits of dignified old gentlemen in winged collars who [look] down from their frames with an assurance" (167). Bates's office reiterates the concept of the Narrator's shallow ambitions to discover his own individuality while Emerson's office demonstrates that the Narrator has a simple disillusioned concept of his African American