Classical Beauty

Barkley L. Hendricks (American, 1945–2017)

oil on canvas

48 in. (121.92 cm)

Lent by “Friends of the Museum.” © Estate of Barkley L. Hendricks. Courtesy of the artist’s estate and Jack Shainman Gallery, New York.

With a piercing gaze, stern facial expression, and a hand on her hip, the subject of this nude portrait stands defiantly before us. As art historian Judith Wilson notes, before the 1960s there was a “paucity of Black nudes in U.S. artistic production,” likely due to negative racial and sexual stereotypes that circulated about the Black female body. After the 1960s artworks depicting the Black nude become a subject matter adopted by contemporary Black artists, often male and often as a celebration of the “Black Is Beautiful” movement. Sister Lucas’s hairstyle further suggests this connection. She dons a dense afro with a colorful scarf loosely tied around her hair. Hendricks’s choice to depict the hair in such a fashion also brings to mind the natural hair movement of the 1960s and ‘70s as a sign of Black cultural pride. Sister Lucas thus inserts new rhetoric and imagery into the void of visual vocabulary associated with Black female bodies.

William Witt (American, 1921–2013)

vintage gelatin silver print

14 x 11 in. (36 x 28 cm)

Gift of Jon and Nicole Ungar, 2016.46.231. Artwork published under fair use.

Photographer William Witt is known for his photographs of New York street scenes. However, he also devoted part of his career to picturing nude female bodies. The women in this series of photographs adopt various poses for the photographer. While three of the photographs are presumably taken in the same setting, one photograph removes the setting entirely, only giving us a view of the woman’s body. Their unrecorded names and invisible faces are a form of erasure, leaving only their Black bodies on view for the world. Playing into Western art traditions of portraying the female nude, Witt’s photographs are layered with a legacy of enslavement, ethnographic exhibition, and conquest of Black bodies. His photographs raise issues about the connotations of the Black female body: hypersexual, unfeminine, obscene, and grotesque. One might question Witt’s relationship to the women. Are they models he employed or perhaps acquaintances?

William Witt (American, 1921–2013)

vintage gelatin silver

8 1/2 x 7 in. (22 x 18 cm)

Gift of Jon and Nicole Ungar, 2016.46.230. Artwork published under fair use.

Photographer William Witt is known for his photographs of New York street scenes. However, he also devoted part of his career to picturing nude female bodies. The women in this series of photographs adopt various poses for the photographer. While three of the photographs are presumably taken in the same setting, one photograph removes the setting entirely, only giving us a view of the woman’s body. Their unrecorded names and invisible faces are a form of erasure, leaving only their Black bodies on view for the world. Playing into Western art traditions of portraying the female nude, Witt’s photographs are layered with a legacy of enslavement, ethnographic exhibition, and conquest of Black bodies. His photographs raise issues about the connotations of the Black female body: hypersexual, unfeminine, obscene, and grotesque. One might question Witt’s relationship to the women. Are they models he employed or perhaps acquaintances?

William Witt (American, 1921–2013)

later gelatin silver print

11 x 13 7/8 in. (27.94 x 35.24 cm)

Gift of Todd Gitlin and Laurel Cook, 2015.53.14. Artwork published under fair use.

Photographer William Witt is known for his photographs of New York street scenes. However, he also devoted part of his career to picturing nude female bodies. The women in this series of photographs adopt various poses for the photographer. While three of the photographs are presumably taken in the same setting, one photograph removes the setting entirely, only giving us a view of the woman’s body. Their unrecorded names and invisible faces are a form of erasure, leaving only their Black bodies on view for the world. Playing into Western art traditions of portraying the female nude, Witt’s photographs are layered with a legacy of enslavement, ethnographic exhibition, and conquest of Black bodies. His photographs raise issues about the connotations of the Black female body: hypersexual, unfeminine, obscene, and grotesque. One might question Witt’s relationship to the women. Are they models he employed or perhaps acquaintances?

William Witt (American, 1921–2013)

printed 1950s, early gelatin silver print

14 x 11 in. (36 x 28 cm)

Gift of Jon and Nicole Ungar, 2016.46.219. Artwork published under fair use.

Photographer William Witt is known for his photographs of New York street scenes. However, he also devoted part of his career to picturing nude female bodies. The women in this series of photographs adopt various poses for the photographer. While three of the photographs are presumably taken in the same setting, one photograph removes the setting entirely, only giving us a view of the woman’s body. Their unrecorded names and invisible faces are a form of erasure, leaving only their Black bodies on view for the world. Playing into Western art traditions of portraying the female nude, Witt’s photographs are layered with a legacy of enslavement, ethnographic exhibition, and conquest of Black bodies. His photographs raise issues about the connotations of the Black female body: hypersexual, unfeminine, obscene, and grotesque. One might question Witt’s relationship to the women. Are they models he employed or perhaps acquaintances?

Hiram Powers (American, 1805–1873)

marble

24 in. (60.96 cm)

McGuigan Collection. Artwork in the public domain.

Hiram Powers’ Greek Slave depicts a Greek woman enslaved by the army of the Ottoman Empire during the Greek War of Independence. Sculpted in white marble,  it captivated audiences upon being first exhibited. White marble was considered void of race; however, the sculpture’s subject was coded as white and palatable to a Euro-American audience. For American abolitionists, the Greek Slave’s parallels to the contemporaneous treatment of enslaved Black women were hard to ignore. Many viewers believed that the Greek woman symbolically represented the Black bodies of enslaved Africans in the United States. While not explicitly depicting the Black body in sculptural form, the subject matter evokes and makes possible the interpretation of the Black female nude in neoclassical sculpture.

Randolph Rogers (American, 1825–1892)

marble

31 7/8 x 16 3/4 x 10 1/2 in. (81 x 42.5 x 26.7 cm)

McGuigan Collection. Artwork in the public domain.

American sculptor Randolph Rogers is best known for his 1855 commissioned reliefs on the doors of the U.S. Capitol, which included one of the earliest examples of a person of African descent in American sculpture. It is probable that this sculpture predates the Capitol commission. Kneeling before the viewer, the allegorical representation of Africa wears and holds material symbolism alluding to her association with the continent: an elephant headdress, coral necklace, gold hoop earrings, and a bountiful cornucopia. Unlike this example, most representations of “Africa” did not always contain African features. Here, the broad nose and full lips indicate that Africa is depicted as a Black woman. The figure’s facial features and thoughtful expression are highly individualistic, suggesting that Rogers likely sought a model of African descent to render the face.