Teaching Resources

In his 1988 print Crow Dance, we see Native American artist Rick Bartow (1946–2016) both following and playing with his own cultural tradition. These works invite the students to engage in cultural inquiry into traditions to understand how artists follow and break with tradition.

Paul Keene’s print suggests connecting various extended family members with community-wide struggles and the promise of the future. “The phrase ‘Final Notice’ is not to signify an end of past hardship, but to proclaim and offer a challenge for a new beginning that will break old cycles.”

This print celebrates the election of Barack Obama as the first Black and 44th president of the United States. It also pays homage to all the exceptional and courageous people who preceded Obama and made his election possible two hundred years after the Slave Act of 1808.

The connection between this couple, the idea of choosing who to love, the institution of marriage, and a family construct was rarely afforded slaves as their own choice. This print explores the connection/disconnection between the institutions of slavery, marriage, and family at different times among Blacks in United
States history.

Rodney Ewing’s print shows the face of a Black youth with the words “My country needs me, and if I were not here I would have to be invented” from Hortense J. Spillers’ “Mama’s Baby, Papa’s Maybe.”

This abstracted image of a Black youth is from the artist’s Urban Warriors series. This young man shows confidence and determination as he confronts the many challenges coming his way, including the anger that society has placed on him due to racism and social injustice.

In this print a Black soldier in a Civil War uniform holds a cross. Other crosses appear on his hands and decorate his uniform. While this soldier may not have the look of a traditional saint, he does have the stature of a noble soldier.

Urban Street Scene — Diversity-rich Brooklyn, NY is home to many religious groups. In this scene, members of a Black Jewish congregation stand in front of a store front house of worship.

“It is the process of formation of what was/is behind my face that my work explores. Through the manipu lation of imagery and color, I hope to reveal some of what goes on behind the changing face of America.“In the print Face-Off, I have taken my face and made it into a mask of Color…the tones are simply layers of ink on a piece of paper, just as skin is a layer of tissue on other tissue.”

The central figure in this color woodcut is inspired by the Aztec goddess Tonantzin, a general title bestowed on female deities who were worshiped by Indigenous peoples living in what is now Mexico and elsewhere in Central America.

“Portrait of a Young Woman is one of a series of portraits I have created which were based on archival photographs of Asian women. Although little is known about the real woman in the print, her face inspired a fictional narrative about the subject’s history (Japanese American internment camps during WWII). Portraiture, as a form of biography, is part of a body of work which attempts to reveal the presence of an inner life in subjects that have often been dehumanized and culturally stereotyped. Portraiture in this context serves as a way to present positive images of Asians in America, who are seen in relation to work, family and the community.”

Hagar’s dress is among a suite of works by Taylor Pickett that reference the Middle Passage – the transport of African captives across the Atlantic as cargo for profit – as the foreground passages and crossings in life. often uses garments, notably dresses, as metaphors or carriers of identity and life story.

The central figure in this color woodcut is inspired by the Aztec goddess Tonantzin, a general title bestowed on female deities who were worshiped by Indigenous peoples living in what is now Mexico and elsewhere in Central America.