On View
Not on viewObject number2014.117
Cabeza Indegena
Artist
Elizabeth Catlett
(American, 1919-2012)
Daten.d.
Mediumlithograph
Dimensionsmat: 24 × 18 in. (61 × 45.7 cm)
sheet: 23 × 17 1/2 in. (58.4 × 44.5 cm)
image: 11 3/4 in. × 10 in. (29.8 × 25.4 cm)
sheet: 23 × 17 1/2 in. (58.4 × 44.5 cm)
image: 11 3/4 in. × 10 in. (29.8 × 25.4 cm)
Credit LineGift of Marion and Conrad Hilberry
Exhibition HistoryEmbracing Diverse Voices: African-American Art in the Collection of the Kalamazoo Institute of Arts, October 3 - November 29, 2009.
"Art, Music & Feminism in the 1950s," KIA Galleries 3 & 4 (January 21 - May 7, 2023).Label TextElizabeth Catlett used her work to address socio-political issues concerning women, African Americans, and Mexicans, saying, “I am interested in women’s liberation for the
fulfillment of women; not just for jobs and equality with men and so on, but for what they can contribute to enrich the world, humanity. Their contributions have been denied them…We need to know more about women.”
Born in Washington, D.C. Catlett was a student in the Howard University Department of Art from 1932 to 1937, studying with the likes of James Porter, Lois Mailou Jones (also in this exhibition), and James Wells. The year after graduating from Howard, she pursued an MFA at the University of Iowa, becoming the first African American to graduate from the program. There, Catlett studied with Grant Wood, who encouraged her to pursue creating work based on the subjects she knew. As a result, her focus turned to black subjects and women and became a life-long passion.
In 1946, Catlett traveled to Mexico to study and came to understand the importance of art’s ability to combat the rampant exploitation of working-class people. Cabeza Indiegena or “Indigenous Head” in Spanish, demonstrates Catlett’s mastery of rendering three-dimensional subjects in a two-dimensional media. The print also recalls the artist’s Black Woman series from the late 1940s, also created during the artist’s time in Mexico that featured Black heroines and regular everyday women. Here, Catlett turns her focus to the women of Mexico, revealing their beauty and humanity. [Label for "Art, Music & Feminism in the 1950s”, 2023]
