Gossip (Two African American women share their views on life and love)
View Similar Items
Elizabeth CatlettGossip (Two African American women share their views on life and love)2005
2005
About the Item
- Creator:Elizabeth Catlett (1915 - 2012, American)
- Creation Year:2005
- Dimensions:Height: 15.38 in (39.07 cm)Width: 18 in (45.72 cm)
- Medium:
- Movement & Style:
- Period:
- Condition:
- Gallery Location:New Orleans, LA
- Reference Number:1stDibs: LU84133174521
Elizabeth Catlett
Promoting social change was Elizabeth Catlett’s prime motivation as an artist. The granddaughter of enslaved people, Catlett was born in Washington, D.C., in 1915 and spent her adult life driven to create sculptures, prints and paintings that would reach, celebrate and uplift those who were barely visible in art.
“I have always wanted my art to service Black people — to reflect us, to relate to us, to stimulate us, to make us aware of our potential,” Catlett said of her work in the 1978 book Art: African American. She studied art history, drawing and other disciplines at Howard University, and as an MFA student at the University of Iowa, her mentor, the painter Grant Wood, advised her to “take as her subject what she knew best.” As she later told an interviewer, “The thing that I knew the most about was Black women, because I am one, and I lived with them all my life, so that’s what I started working with.”
The centerpiece of Catlett’s spring 1940 thesis project, Negro Mother and Child — a figure of a Black mother embracing her child, carved from Indiana limestone — was awarded first place for sculpture at the American Negro Exposition in Chicago held that year.
Catlett taught art at Dillard University in New Orleans — where she battled discrimination daily — and met her first husband, artist Charles White, while living in Chicago. She resigned from Dillard in 1942 and moved to New York City. There Catlett befriended painter Jacob Lawrence and studied lithography and other media at the Art Students League. Inspired by her studies with Ossip Zadkine, she began to incorporate abstract forms into her wood and stone sculptures.
In 1946, a grant supported her travel to Mexico to study its murals and graphic art. As Catlett had experienced the barbaric and deeply destructive system of racial segregation that the Jim Crow laws enforced in the United States, Mexico felt like a welcome escape. She would make the country her home and create much of her work there, divorcing White and marrying painter and printmaker Francisco Mora of the Taller de Gráfica Popular (People's Graphic Workshop), or TGP, in 1947. She collaborated with TGP, a graphic arts workshop dedicated to social issues located in Mexico City, on a number of works, including one of her best-known linoleum cut prints, Sharecropper (1952). The heroic depiction of an anonymous farm worker was intended to draw attention to the plight of Black tenant farmers who were ruthlessly exploited by the era’s white landowners.
Another iconic work of Catlett’s is Black Unity (1968), a raised fist sculpted from cedar, smooth and gleaming, with one side taking the form of two faces that resemble carved African masks. In the same year, the raised fist, a powerful symbol of the Civil Rights struggle and emblem of the Black Power movement, had been immortalized by two Black American athletes, John Carlos and Tommie Smith, who raised their black-gloved fists during the playing of the “Star-Spangled Banner” at the Summer Olympics in Mexico City.
Catlett was a professor of sculpture at the National Autonomous University of Mexico’s School of Fine Arts in Mexico City from 1958 until 1976, when she retired to focus on making art, exhibiting extensively in the years that followed. In 2003, she completed the Ralph Ellison Memorial in New York’s Riverside Park. That same year she received a lifetime achievement award from the International Sculpture Center. Her work is in the collections of museums worldwide, including the Smithsonian American Art Museum, Museum of Modern Art and the Metropolitan Museum of Art.
Find a range of authentic Elizabeth Catlett art today on 1stDibs.
- Black and White (School children in Gambia, West Africa)By Benno ThomaLocated in New Orleans, LAThis black and white image is of an excited group of school children in Gambia, West Africa This impression is #1 of an edition of 10. It is printed on Hahnemuhle Photo Rag Ultra Smooth paper that meets the highest industry standards regarding density, color gamut, color graduation and image sharpness. This white 100% rag paper guarantees archival standards. Benno Thoma was born in the university city of Maastricht on the southern tip of the Netherlands in November, 1956. He strives to stimulate our senses in his photographs and to move his audience to touch, feel and experience his vision. Thoma's photographs show us the beauty in each aspect of the composition. There is a tactile feel to his material, a positive energy that comes from the light that gives nuance to the subtle colors created. Arranged together with the beauty and dignity of the human body his technique invites us to become one with the scene. He travels around the world to create his images and strives to bathe his subjects in the natural light of that locale. Above all he captures the sense of place, its uniqueness -- cultural, natural or architectural. His newest photographs manipulate the element of water and light to express his vision of the male body – in both its innocence and vulnerability. Thoma uses movement and composition to capture the beauty of the body. The German publishing house of Bruno Gmunder has published five monographs of the work of Thoma. His photographs chronicle the luxurious properties of the Kempinski Hotel Group, the beautiful young actors of Bel Ami...Category
21st Century and Contemporary Contemporary Portrait Photography
MaterialsPhotographic Paper, Archival Pigment
- Laura (Woman's head as seen thru water droplets which in turn are body parts)By Rollin LeonardLocated in New Orleans, LA"Laura" first looks like a color abstract. Then very slowly you realize it is an extreme close up of a young woman's face. Only slowly do the water droplets appear with each drople...Category
2010s Contemporary Figurative Photography
MaterialsPhotographic Paper, Archival Pigment
- Alyssa (Woman's head as seen thru water droplets which in turn are body parts)By Rollin LeonardLocated in New Orleans, LAAliyssa first looks like a color abstract. Then very slowly you realize it is an extreme close up of a young woman's face. Only slowly do the water droplets appear with each drople...Category
2010s Contemporary Figurative Photography
MaterialsPhotographic Paper, Archival Pigment
- Bedside View (Sunlight streams through window across body of young woman)By Brinley RibandoLocated in New Orleans, LAa sexy young girl lies in bed bathed in sunlightCategory
2010s American Modern Black and White Photography
MaterialsDigital Pigment
- November (These boots are made for walking)By Brinley RibandoLocated in New Orleans, LAA black and white photograph of a young woman in boots. Brinley Ribando is a painter, printmaker, and photographer based in New Orleans, Louisiana. He...Category
2010s American Modern Figurative Photography
MaterialsDigital Pigment
- Marlboro Out the Window (These Boots are made for walking)By Brinley RibandoLocated in New Orleans, LAA color photograph showing a young woman in boots with a pack of MarlboroCategory
2010s American Modern Figurative Photography
MaterialsDigital Pigment
- ThwartedBy Andrew PinkhamLocated in Philadelphia, PAThis archival illustrative photography pigment print on cotton rag by Andrew Pinkham measures 20in x 16in and is signed and numbered. This piece is part of a small edition of 10. A...Category
21st Century and Contemporary Contemporary Portrait Photography
MaterialsArchival Pigment, Archival Paper
- Monograph: The Complete Paintings (Hand signed, inscribed by Philip Pearlstein)By Philip PearlsteinLocated in New York, NYPhilip Pearlstein The Complete Paintings, 1984 Hardback monograph with dust jacket Hand signed, dated and inscribed to Nadine by Philip Pearlstein 12 × 10 1/2 × 1 3/4 inches This i...Category
1980s Realist Figurative Prints
MaterialsOffset, Lithograph, Mixed Media, Ink, Paper
- "POP" Ingrid Baars X Popovy Sisters 35x40 in Original photography Edition of 12By Popovy SistersLocated in Culver City, CA"POP" Ingrid Baars X Popovy Sisters 35" x 40" inch Original photography Edition of 12 Dutch Visual Artist Collaborated With Doll Makers To Create Sur...Category
21st Century and Contemporary Modern Portrait Photography
MaterialsRag Paper, Archival Pigment
- Hand coloured print in blue Portrait of a devil creature immobilised in marbleLocated in London, GBKatie Eleanor, St Medard and the Devil, 2019 Handcoloured portrait of a devil creature, immobilised in marble, inspired by the tale of St Medard. Purchasing on his rock, he lovingly...Category
2010s Gothic Figurative Prints
MaterialsWatercolor, Photographic Paper, Archival Pigment
- Watercolour Photo Print of Male as Daphne with Flowers as Marble SculptureLocated in London, GBHandcoloured portrait of nymph Daphne, immobilised in marble, as she is transformed into a laurel tree. Birthed in Greek Mythology, Daphne is associated with bodies of freshwater and is an unwilling object of the god Apollo’s desire. Taken from The Sialia Marbles, a series of portraits containing ephemeral human sculptures taken between 2016-19. Together these works act as tales contained in a fictional sculpture hall, in direct reaction to Andre Malraux’s 1947 Le Musee Imaginaire (Museum Without Walls). Original title: Daphne II...Category
2010s Romantic Figurative Prints
MaterialsSpray Paint, Watercolor, Archival Pigment
$836 Sale Price35% Off - Only Elvis signed limited edition printBy BATIKLocated in London, GBOnly Elvis by B A T I K signed limited edition print pop art print of the infamous mock arrest mugshot of Elvis Presley. Archival pigment print paper size 20x16 inches / 51 x ...Category
2010s Pop Art Figurative Prints
MaterialsColor, Archival Pigment