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Untitled from the Zwarte Piet series
Untitled from the Zwarte Piet series
On View
Not on view
Object number2005.36

Untitled from the Zwarte Piet series

Artist (British, 1961-)
Date2000
MediumC-print
Dimensionsimage: 8 1/4 × 7 7/8 in. (21 × 20 cm)
sheet: 12 × 10 in. (30.5 × 25.4 cm)
mat: 20 × 16 in. (50.8 × 40.6 cm)
Credit LineGift of Lawrence K. and Maxine Snider
Label TextEach winter, children in The Netherlands eagerly await the arrival of Sinterklaas, who brings candy and presents to those who have been good. This white-bearded saint rides into town surrounded by his black-faced servants, the so-called Zwarte Piet. Usually portrayed by white teenagers in elaborate clown-like costumes, the Zwarte Piet throw candy to the crowds of children and shake branches at the naughty. In her portraits of the Zwarte Piet, British photographer Anna Fox explores this Dutch tradition, which raises issues of race, class, and gender – ultimately questioning what it means in the advent of growing racial diversity to hold onto a tradition that demonizes and mystifies the foreign. Visually, Fox’s portraits recall the formal presentation of seventeenth-century Dutch paintings.

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