RP: Thank you so much for meeting me here today.
AD: No problem.
RP: Let's start shall we? Tell me about the time and place that you lived.
AD: Well, I was born on May 26, 1899, in Topeka, Kansas. Life was harsh at the time, I grew up in a poor family, me, my many siblings, and my parents, Aaron and Elizabeth Douglas. As I grew older, I attended Topeka High School in 1913, and graduated in spring 1917. A year later, I joined the University of Nebraska and got a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree in 1922. I wanted to share my knowledge of art, so I also taught for two years at Lincoln High school. Then I decided to move to Harlem, New York to pursue my artistic carrier.I remember one day what I told a reporter, much like you, about my experience in New York. “There are so many things that I had seen for the first time,” I said,” so many impressions I was getting. One was that of seeing a big city that was entirely black, from beginning to end you were impressed by the fact that black people were in charge of things and her was a black city and here was a situation that was eventually to be the center for the great in American Culture.” (July 16, 1971 interview with leslie M. collins, professor of english. black oral histories, Fisk university library.) I was brought in by this community, and immediately, my art carrier was set off. I had illustrations in magazines, books, and was even commissioned to paint murals! Eventually, I created my most memorable and important series in my life in the early 1930’s.
RP: What events in your early life influenced you entering the artistic carrier?
AD: It all started with my mother’s watercolors and drawings which influenced my wanting to be an artist. Then when my mother brought back a magazine with Henry Ossawa Tanner’s Christ and Nicodemus, I realized that an African American could have a career in art. I remember staring at it for the longest time and thinking to myself, this is what I want to do.
But it was only until I moved to Harlem, when I became interested in painting African art. When I moved, I met and studied with another artist by the name of Weinold Reiss. He encouraged me to research my African background for artistic inspiration. After receiving this advice, I found my own artistic style. I combined modern with African American art to show the struggles of blacks in history.
RP: How did mentors help you succeed in being an artist?
RP: How did mentors help you succeed in being an artist?
AD: Moving to Harlem gave me a wealth of mentors. I was surrounded by blacks that were showing the world that they weren’t held back by all of the racial prejudices. That they could be successful no matter what race they were as well as developing true Afrocentric art forms.
Shortly after arriving in Harlem, I needed a job, and came across the office of Crisis magazine. There, I met W.E.B. Du Bois, who hired me for the potion of mailroom clerk, promising the opportunities for illustration work.
While in New York, I also became an apprentice to German modernist Winold Reiss who was interested in modernism and cubism but pushed me to explore my African background to find inspiration in their work, something I was reluctant to do.
RP: What was art like when you entered the artistic field at the time?
RP: What was art like when you entered the artistic field at the time?
AD: I entered the artistic field at time of the Harlem Renaissance. At this time, the Harlem Renaissance was mostly literature. Novels, poems, magazine articles… But as I became more immersed in art, the movement became less secluded to only literature, and it began to accept painters, musicians and dancers, a widespread community.
Harlem was a creative community, full of black artists. Du Bois, was a great figure in Harlem, gathering all of those black artists and creating a community inside of a community. This community was created to prove that colored people are just as talented as whites.
RP: How did the major cultural, economic and political situations of the time impact your work?
RP: How did the major cultural, economic and political situations of the time impact your work?
AD: When I mainly started my carrier it was about 1922. A little bit later, I began getting into African art. Because of the racial predjudice going on at the time, I incorporated black breaking free from those prejudices. Although civil rights for blacks were almost non-existent at this time, because I lived in Harlem during the harlem renaissance I was surrounded by a community where blacks were in charge. Also many black leaders were there, including W.E.B. De Bois who was still pushing for colored people equality.
Then, in 1929, the stock market crashed and the great depression emerged. Because of the loss in jobs, F.D.R. created the PWAP to give jobs to artists, among many of the other job programs. Under the sponsorship of this program, I was hired to create my most famous series of paintings called “Aspects of Negro Life”.
RP: What were your major accomplishments? Describe your art.
RP: What were your major accomplishments? Describe your art.
AD: My most major accomplishment was probably my series of murals titled “Aspects of Negro Life,” in the New York Public Library. These murals really showed the life of a struggling African American. They showed blacks breaking from the chains of slavery.They showed blacks dancing and enjoying themselves. They really showed the aspects of Negro life.
My accomplishments lead to another huge accomplishment. My title as the “Father of African American arts,” but I always dismissed it saying, “Do not call me the Father of African American Arts, for I am just a son of Africa, and paint for what inspires me.”
My art is oil on canvas. A mixture of modern with African artistic styles. Instead of using actual human bodies, I instead showed the silhouette of a man or woman. The paintings showed African American struggles.
RP: What key opportunities did you have that helped you become successful?
RP: What key opportunities did you have that helped you become successful?
AD: I had so many great opportunities. A great one was meeting W.E.B. Du Bois, who gave me a job as a mailroom clerk. Even though thats were I worked, he promised to help me with my artwork, and copies of my art have been printed in Crisis Magazine countless times.
Also having the chance to be apprenticed to Winold Reiss was amazing, being taught so many things and being encouraged to look up my African past. Being his apprentice allowed me to meet other artists, and provided illustrations in Alain Locke’s The New Negro.
Growing and developing as can artist also gave me the opportunities to travel across the U.S. and in some cases, the world.
RP: What was a roadblock that you ran into that you had to overcome to be an artist?
RP: What was a roadblock that you ran into that you had to overcome to be an artist?
AD: A set back I would have to say is that I planned on taking my carrier to Paris. I planned on going there to be a real artist. But then I made a detour in Harlem, and found out about the “New Negro” movement and made the hard decision to stay. Even though that was a set back, if I had never taken that detour, I would have never done all the things that I did.
Another set back was that I was born into a poor family. Being an artist and wanting to go to college meant that I needed money, so I spent a lot of time trying to raise the money I needed to go to college. I was determined however to go to school, so I saved up enough money and joined the University of Nebraska.
RP: Tell me about some personal stories about how you became a successful artist.
RP: Tell me about some personal stories about how you became a successful artist.
AD: My success started very slowly at first. I was in search for a job, so I went to the Crisis Magazine building. Mr. Du Bois hired me for the only job that was available, a mailroom clerk.
While I was there however, I got the chance to show him my artwork and he said he would try to give me opportunities to do illustration work.
Eventually he came through and I got all types of illustration jobs. I got to work with magazines like Vanity Fair, Fire!!, including Mr Du Bois’ very own, Crisis, along with books like “The New Negro.”
RP: How did your art impact the world?
RP: How did your art impact the world?
AD: My work impacted the art world, by just being different.When I first went into the art carrier, I had the intentions of doing classical art, something that everyone knew well. But Reiss helped me find my own artistic style. Something that was personal and that no body had seen before. Something like modern and African mixed together to create a new experience out of the old that it was showing.
I don’t really think it’s just the art that impacted the world. I mainly think it was the fact that I’m a black artist who proved all of the racism wrong. Proved that I can make art just as good as a white person can. That blacks can succeed in life.
RP: Again, thank you so much.
AD: Of course, any time.
Aaron Douglas, anb.org, American National Biography Online, http://www.anb.org/articles/17/17-00233.html
RP: Again, thank you so much.
AD: Of course, any time.
No comments:
Post a Comment