Jacob Lawrence
Shortly after I graduated from university with a bachelors degree in art, I found myself in a gallery of the Oakland Museum with a survey exhibition of the paintings of Jacob Lawrence. After several years of focusing my most serious attention on the technical processes of printmaking—metal plate etching and photographic darkroom, Lawrence's works, executed in tempera, appeared fresh and alive. I was alert to the restraint of his palette, the flat geometry of his figures, and the clarity and frankness of his subjects. The power of Jacob Lawrence's work derives first from his stories, both historical and observed, and then, equally, from the arrangements and playful movement of shapes in flat color, which serve as an emotional counterweight, a lightness, to balance the gravity of his subjects. To be sure, Jacob Lawrence was working to illuminate the lives and the history of Black Americans 75 years before Black Lives Matter.
—E.F. 9/1/2020
Cover image: Jacob Lawrence, from The Migration Series: “One of the largest race riots occurred in East St. Louis.”
Links to sources: https://www.npr.org/sections/codeswitch/2015/04/10/398806751/painting-the-epic-drama-of-the-great-migration-the-work-of-jacob-lawrence