According to Britannica, Betye Saar, also known as Betye Irene Brown, is an American artist and educator whose groundbreaking work has left an indelible mark on the art world. Born on July 30, 1926, in Los Angeles, California, Saar's artistic journey began with a deep exploration of themes related to race, gender, and identity. After studying design at the University of California, Los Angeles, where she earned her Bachelor of Arts degree in 1949, Saar continued her education in education and printmaking at California State University, Long Beach, from 1958 to 1962. It was during this time that she began to hone her craft and develop her unique artistic voice. Saar worked mostly with prints and images in the early 1960s, but her true passion …show more content…
"The Liberation of Aunt Jemima" (1972), one of Saar's best-known pieces, is a potent illustration of her investigation of gender and race. A "mammy" doll, a parody of a desexualized, obliging slave lady, is positioned in front of Aunt Jemima's pancake syrup labels in this assemblage piece. By affirming the agency and strength of Black women, the doll challenges racist beliefs and stereotypes while holding a shotgun in one hand and a broom in the other. Saar's body of work grew larger and more comprehensive over her career, embracing room-size installations and enticing public participation. Her interest in African traditional customs was evident in her installations, which frequently featured shrines and invited visitors to add artifacts to the pieces. Saar's creations have been shown around the nation and are part of esteemed collections that include the Los Angeles County Museum of Art and the Museum of Modern Art in New …show more content…
By portraying Mammy as a symbol of maternal strength and protection, this iconography challenges the stereotype of her as a caregiver for white children. An upright black fist, a potent sign of resistance and solidarity, covers the lower part of the painted figure. The box's floor is covered in cotton and cotton pods, symbolizing the past of Black labor exploitation and slavery. The Aunt Jemima breakfast food brand is represented by the recurring pictures of a smiling woman in the backdrop. The juxtaposition of images—commercial branding and racial caricatures—highlights how Black identity in American society has been dehumanized and made into a commodity. Through her meticulous arrangement of found objects and her subversion of racial stereotypes, Saar challenges viewers to confront the legacy of racism and oppression in America, while also celebrating the resilience and agency of Black women. Furthermore, Betye Saar's "The Liberation of Aunt Jemima" explores many
When Saar was a teacher at the University of California including Otis Art Institute since then has been changed to Otis College of Art and Design. When Saar started she used larger, room-size scale, which she created specific installations that may had altered shrines exploring the relationship among the technology and spirituality, also including the interests in mysticism and Voodoo. Saar discussed while continues to challenge the negative ideas of African Americans. Saar had done of the master a piece that is titled “The Liberations of Aunt Jemima.” This is a picture that was originally made out of a wooden box that had a full-figured, smiling black mammy, in a kerchief wrapped around her head. It shows Mammy holding broom in one hand and a gun in the other. Yet, Saar still resides and works in Los Angeles; she is the mother of Alison and Lezley Saar, both who are artists. In the Saar shop or known as studio is scattered with art all over the place. Tables and shelf are all scattered with mysterious objects and materials, pickanninny dolls, tiny minstrels, including slices of watermelon made from painted wood.
The Major religions spread across Eurasia and Africa through trade routes and conquest. Along with the religions came ideas and practices to new and distance places, changing local populations and create new traditional beliefs and customs.
Annie’s role is that of the stereotypical Mammy. The Mammy as a controlling image influences Black women deeply, for she is the caregiver to White children while neglecting her own, she cooks and cleans after a White family and is happy while doing so, thus as she works hard as men do, she is not viewed in the same feminine lens. Collins describes how this image was created to justify the exploitation of Black women doing domestic services, “by loving, nurturing, and caring for her White children and “family” better than her own, the mammy symbolizes the dominant group’s perceptions of the ideal Black female relationship to elite White male power” (71). Therefore even as Annie takes care of her daughter and Lora’s, Annie is eager and accepting of her subordination. Collins further states “Black women who internalize the mammy image potentially become effective conduits for perpetuating racial oppression. Ideas about mammy buttress racial hierarchies in other ways. Employing Black women in mammified occupations supports the racial superiority of White employers” (72). This is seen within the film, both by the role Annie symbolizes and the fact that this role was offered to Black women during that
Harriet Powers’ quilts were first seen at a crafts fair by an artist, a Southern white woman named Jennie Smith. Ms. Smith, who kept a diary and upon first meeting Harriet, recalls -- "I found the owner, a negro woman, who lived in the country on a little farm whereon she and her husband made a respectable living. She is about sixty five years old, of a clear ginger cake color, and is a very clean and interesting woman who loves to talk of her 'old miss' and life 'befo de wah.' " At first Harriet Powers was unwilling to sell her quilts to Ms. Smith. Yet when she and her family came into financial difficulty she agreed to sell them. Ms Smith writes -- " Last year I sent her word that I would buy it if she still wanted to dispose of it. She arrived one afternoon in front of my door in an ox-cart with the precious burden in her lap encased in a clean flour sack, which was still enveloped in a crocus sack. She offered it for ten dollars, but I told her I only had five to give. After going out consulting with her husband she returned and said 'Owin to de hardness of de times, my ole man lows I'd better tech hit.' Not being a new woman she obeyed. After giving me a full description of each scene with great earnestness, she departed but has been back several times to visit the darling offspring of her brain.
emphasizes the concept that colored women had been oppressed and time after time did not receive any sort of reconciliation. White explains how it is quite difficult to find specific facts on what colored women withstood at the time but when you look actively enough, you will surely find it. White clarifies the two major archetypes that colored women were forced to identify with. The first being Jezebel, the highly inappropriate and submissive character, was created from the white man’s distorted view on colored women’s clothing choice which women chose in order to comfortably work in the most efficient way. Many of the women worked in the outdoor heat which led to them rolling up their tops and bottoms in order to avoid overheating which would lead to the slowing down of their work. The second archetype, that of Mammy, was created to comfort white women in a way. The slave owners wanted to be reassured that the slaves were equipped and efficient. White indicates that the Mammy slaves were not liked for long as they were contracting the notion that white women were of any use in their own
Black women were free only in a sense. They were typecast in real life into providing domestic services for affluent white families” (The Mammy Caricature). The mammy caricature basically was an image that was given to mammy 's but in reality mammy 's hated their jobs and were unhappy in the way they were treated “the mammy caricature was more a myth than accurate portrayal” (The mammy Caricature). Aunt jemima was another representation of a mammy in Clinging to mammy The faithful slave in Twentieth-century America “Aunt jemima trademark cemented an idea of what a mammy looked and acted like for generations of consumers” (Micki
Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl by Harriet Jacobs strongly speaks to its readers by describing the brutalities of slavery and the way slave owners can destroy peaceful lives. After reading and rereading the story have noticed certain things regarding how Jacobs tries to educate her readers and her intended audience which is the women of the North. As if we do not know enough about how terrible slavery is, this story gives detailed examples of the lives of slaves and provokes an incredible amount of emotions. She uses several tactics in her writing to reach her desired audience and does so very well.
The Mammy caricature was portrayed as a pitch black skinned, fat, and happy slave who served her master and mistress
This quilt was Ringgold’s first quilt that told a story. She wanted to tell her story because no one had done it yet so, she felt the need to do it (Thompson). Not only was this art piece made in an untraditional way, which was textiles, Ringgold also gave a better and more respectable depiction of Aunt Jemima. It talks about both sides of her oppression. The previous idea of her was a caricature of a housemaid that took care of a family’s kids, cleaned and cooked. Ringgold goes into Jemima’s history and brings the caricature meaning. This quilt not only addresses the racist issues surrounding Aunt Jemima but also the one-sided depiction of women being used as objects. She does this to make a representation of someone who is part of her culture be seen as more than a thing to sell. It makes people think about how they view people of color in shown as social icons and just in the media in general (Thompson). This can incite change in
Harriet Jacobs’ Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl is one of the few narratives depicting the degradation’s endured by female slaves at the hand of brutal masters. Jacobs’ narrative is sending a message to women to come together and end the unfair treatment all women are subjected to. By bringing images of slavery and the message of unity of women to the forefront, Jacobs is attempting to end the tyranny over women perpetrated by men and the tyranny over blacks perpetrated by whites. Integrity and agency are ideals that Americans have fought for over the years. Jacobs reshapes these ideas and makes decisions and takes full reposibilities for her actions to become the ideal and representative image of womanhood.
Slave Women in Harriet Jacobs' Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl and Toni Morrison's Beloved
“Portraying African-American women as stereotypical mammies, matriarchs, welfare recipients, and hot mommas helps justify U.S. black women’s oppression” (Patricia Hill Collins, Feminist Thought Sister Citizen 51). In early American history, racial stereotypes played a significant role in shaping the attitude African Americans. Stereotypes such a mammy, jezebel, sapphire and Aunt Jemimah were used to characterize African American women. Mammy was a black masculine nursemaid who was in charge of the white children. The stereotype jezebel, is a woman who wants sex all the time. White Americans saw black women as loose, oversexed and immoral. This stereotype still lives today because men especially whites look for black women to be their prostitutes.
These illustrations, along with many others, are the types of images Harriet Jacobs instills upon her readers in her personal narrative Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl. With basic knowledge of what comprises a slave narrative, one might assume Jacobs' attempt at a personal creation has the same goals as many others, to teach her audience of the personal hardships of slaves and to inspire a form of hope that an end of slavery is near. Upon the reading and analysis of this narrative, however, it is easy to see how Jacobs' narrative differs from her colleagues. Jacobs' intentions are laid out when she states, "Slavery is terrible for men; but it is far more terrible for women"(825). It becomes evident that Jacobs is writing for all female slaves and wants her audience to understand that being a woman in slavery was the most difficult situation a human being could endure. Although a very large endeavor, Jacobs' succeeds in her task by creating a narrative that speaks out to one particular audience, free white women of the north. By creating a narrative that is truly feminist, bo...
nerves are a wreck. He is a 21 year-old drunk that is adored by his
The Kitchen Table Series by Carrie Mae Weems is a photo series comprised of 24 black-and-white images that represent the weight household spaces carry regarding intimacy and domesticity, as well as the woman’s role in a nuclear household. Carrie Mae Weems is both an artist and an activist, reflecting on her personal experiences as well as the experience of specifically black women contextualized through history and art. This essay argues that Weems uses her art, specifically this photo series, to hold a space for black women who are historically misunderstood and underrepresented in art; Weems' use of lighting, gesture, and position in these images brings attention to her lived experiences as well as that of the black woman, which harbors a