Kara Walker: Harper’s Pictorial History of the Civil War (Annotated) at New Britain Museum of American Art
In her 2005 series of 15 large-scale prints, Kara Walker is challenging what we know about American history.
“The Silhouette says a lot with very little information, but that’s also what the stereotype does.”
As soon as I set foot in the gallery, I knew this was going to be an incredible exhibit. I’m a huge Kara Walker fan at the best of times, but combining her powerful silhouettes with historical documents, takes these pieces to a whole different level.
Buzzard’s Roost Pass, 2005
Offset lithography and silkscreen on Somerset Textured paper
Harper’s was the most popular magazine during the 1860’s and in 1866 it issued a Pictorial History of the Civil War, with the intention of narrating events of the Civil War and “just as they occurred”.
But the two -volume compendium merely hinted , or indeed completely failed to mention any of the experiences of racism or violence that people of colour suffered.
Crest of Pine Mountain, Where General Polk Fell, 2015
In 1864, Union troops entered the heart of Georgia in a a campaign to take the strategic city of Atlanta. This print depicts Pine Mountain, where one of the pivotal battles of the campaign took place. During the battle, Confederate General Leonidas Polk was killed by a Union artillery round, in a serious blow to the Confederate cause.
The original Harper's Illustration depicts at its centre four prominently-lit tree stumps, in a poetic evocation of loss. Kara’s version of the image is dominated by women whose figure and kerchief link her to the pervasive ‘mammy’ stereotype, and who lifts her arms as if in praise or lamentation. Behind her, a girl swings as an ax - a reference, perhaps to all those fallen in the war
Continuing her pioneering work of confronting inequality, prejudice and stereotypes through America’s history, Kara Walker (born 1969, USA) has taken 15 enlarged woodcut plates from the Harper’s Pictorial History of the Civil War and overlaid them with her own silkscreen figures.
An Army Train, 2005
Offset lithography and silkscreen on Somerset Textured paper
Kara’s figures are made using the sentimental art form of cut-out silhouettes, which we usually associate with 19th century portraits for wealthy white people, they immediately make me think of every film made from a Jane Austen novel.
Instead, Kara uses these silhouettes to disrupt the original image, highlighting the traumatic scenarios that were left out of the ‘official’ record. This time around , Kara is putting Black Americans front and centre, ensuring they are impossible to ignore.
Cotton Hoards in Southern Swamp, 2005
In the mid-1800’s, the entire South was economically and politically dependent on cotton, as well as slave labour to plant, maintain, and harvest the crop. When the southern states seceded from he United States to form the Confederated States of America in 1861, they used cotton to provide revenue for its government, arms for its military, and the economic power for a diplomatic strategy for the fledgling Confederate nation.
Throughout the Civil War, Union troops were tasked with finding and confiscating cotton produced by Southern plantations. Confederates hid hoards of cotton bales in swamps along these waterways in an attempt to prevent Union troops from finding them, as depicted in this scene. Emerging from the swamp, Walker overlays a moss-covered figure, referring perhaps to runaway enslaved people who also took to hiding in swamps and marshlands during the Civil War.
NBMAA acquired a set of Walker’s 2005 print series last year and have chosen to debut them for the launch of their 2020/20+ Women @ NBMAA initiative, which, in honour of the centennial of women’s suffrage in America, will see all exhibitions for 2020 focusing on female artists.
Kara Walker: Harper’s Pictorial History of the Civil War (Annotated) in on display at the New Britain Museum of American Art, until Sunday 23rd August.
Find out more about the NBMAA on their website, including details of how to reserve a time to see the exhibit.