Josie
Linocut on paper
Support size: 11 x 8 1/8 inches; Image size: 8 1/8 x 6 1/8 inches
Circa 1940
As Exhibited in:
Elevation from Within: The Study of Art at Historically Black Colleges and Universities, 2019–2024, TJC Gallery, Spartanburg, South Carolina, 2019; Richardson Family Art Museum, Wofford College, Spartanburg, South Carolina, 2021; Fisk University, Nashville, Tennessee, 2022, Florida A&M University, Tallahassee, Florida, 2023, Morgan State University, Baltimore, Maryland, 2024
When interviewed about his art, Charles Wilbert White said: “Paint is the only weapon that I have with which to fight what I resent. If I could write, I would write about it. If I could talk, I would talk about it. Since I paint, I must paint about it.” A painter, draftsman, and printmaker, White endeavored to marry his art to his beliefs. Favoring the plight of African Americans as his subject, White’s artwork speaks to the black experience in the United States.
When White’s wife and fellow artist Elizabeth Catlett was awarded a Julius Rosenwald Foundation fellowship in 1946, White followed her to Mexico. While Catlett worked on a series centered on African American women, White was able to study directly with the muralists he had admired since his time in the WPA. The pair also became associated with the Taller de Gráfica Popular, an artists’ print collective with which White honed his skills in lithography. Featuring a morose female face, slightly distorted in its orientation, Josie is representative of White’s technique in that period: the expressive hatching lends the image drama and dimension.
Graphic art became “an integral part of the struggle” in White’s political activism. The dense, dynamic Social Realist style that had characterized his earlier output gave way to works on paper executed in charcoal or muted oils, works White described as “images of dignity.” As artist, teacher, and citizen, White remained engaged in socio-political issues throughout his life, especially those related to the civil rights movement.
Other works by this artist