Weekend, May 29-30, 2021 – WILLIAM H. JOHNSON ARTSWORKS PORTRAY BLACK SOLDIER’S LIVES
WEEKEND, MAY 29-30, 2021
The 376th Edition
William H. Johnson
SOLDIERS AT WAR
AND PEACE
SMITHSONIAN AMERICAN ART MUSEUM
William H. Johnson, Off to War, ca. 1942-1944, oil on plywood, Smithsonian American Art Museum, Gift of the Harmon Foundation, 1967.59.605
In 1942, on National Negro Achievement Day, William H. Johnson received a certificate of honor for his “distinguished service to America in Art.” The award recognized his scenes of black soldiers, which Johnson began painting after the attack on Pearl Harbor. Off to War shows a young man leaving his family in the rural South. Just up the road, a figure on a bus sticks his head out to urge him on. The family forms a pattern of red, white and blue that contrasts with the menacing, bile-colored horizon. Three telephone poles like the crosses on Calvary march into the distance, conveying a blessing on the young soldier or suggesting perhaps the sacrifice that he might have to make.
William H. Johnson, Soldiers Training, ca. 1942, oil on plywood, Smithsonian American Art Museum, Gift of the Harmon Foundation, 1967.59.582
Pearl Harbor inspired two government-sponsored art exhibitions in 1942, for which William H. Johnson painted scenes of African Americans involved in the war effort. Soldiers Training contrasts the patriotism of black enlistees with the military’s segregationist policies. Black soldiers served in their own units, “black” blood was kept separate from “white,” and recruits took on the most menial jobs at Army bases and aboard ships. Johnson may have painted this scene based on reports of the “Buffalo Soldiers” who were training at Fort Huachuca, Arizona. Set in a desolate camp ringed by mountains, Soldiers Training suggests the isolation that black soldiers experienced among hundreds of thousands of men and women committed to winning the war.
William H. Johnson, Lessons in a Soldier’s Life, ca. 1942, tempera and pen and ink with pencil on paper, Smithsonian American Art Museum, Gift of the Harmon Foundation, 1967.59.171
William H. Johnson, Soldiers’ Morning Bath, ca. 1941-1942, tempera and pen and ink with pencil on paper, Smithsonian American Art Museum, Gift of the Harmon Foundation, 1967.59.1049
William H. Johnson, Lessons in a Soldier’s Life, ca. 1942, tempera and pen and ink with pencil on paperboard, Smithsonian American Art Museum, Gift of the Harmon Foundation, 1967.59.1050
William H. Johnson, War Scene–Three Soldiers with Bayonnets, ca. 1942, tempera and pen and ink with pencil on paper, Smithsonian American Art Museum, Gift of the Harmon Foundation, 1967.59.156
William H. Johnson (1901–1970), “Crute” Drill, about 1942–1944, oil on paperboard, 24 7/8 x 32 7/8 in., Smithsonian American Art Museum, Gift of the Harmon Foundation, 1967.59.600
HARRIET TUBMAN
- William H. Johnson, Harriet Tubman, ca. 1945, oil on paperboard, Smithsonian American Art Museum, Gift of the Harmon Foundation, 1967.59.1146
- In 1938, William H. Johnson and his wife, Holcha Krake, arrived in New York after fleeing a tumultuous
Europe on the brink of war. His homecoming sparked the need to “paint his own people”–a sentiment influenced by Holcha, who, as a textile artist, understood the importance of tradition in contemporary culture.
Harriet Tubman is part of Johnson’s 1945 series, Fighters for Freedom, which depicted the heroic figures who led the fight for racial and individual equality. Tubman’s likeness is taken from a popular woodcut first published in the 1922 book The Negro in Our Times by Carter G. Woodson. Standing at attention in Civil War-era dress and holding a shotgun at her side, Tubman appears stoic and resolute. Behind her, a path extends into the distance, interwoven with sketchily drawn railroad tracks that split the landscape in two. Beside the young, active Tubman is a bust-length portrait of the elderly woman draped in a lace shawl, perhaps the one given to her by Queen Victoria around 1897.
AN IDEA FOR A RAINY WEEKEND
This arrived from a visitor to Blackwell House:
I and a group of four adult students of English from the Rennert school in midtown Manhattan came to the Blackwell House today at about 3:30PM, and we were given a wonderfully informative tour by Andrew. He was extremely welcoming and knowledgeable and his energy was fantastic. I had been to the island many times before, but I had never been inside the Blackwell House, and I was thrilled that we were able to get such a friendly, enthusiastic, and information-packed tour from Andrew.
Thank you!
Best Regards,
HAVE YOU VISITED BLACKWELL HOUSE?
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WEEKEND PHOTO OF THE DAY
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FRIDAY PHOTO OF THE DAY
BROOKLYN CHILDREN’S MUSEUM
GLORIA HERMAN GOT IT.
THIS IS THE BUILDING ENTRANCE THAT REPLACED THE RIHS VISITOR CENTER WHICH WAS THE ORIGINAL ENTRY
Text by Judith Berdy
Thanks to Bobbie Slonevsky for her dedication to Blackwell’s Almanac and the RIHS
Thanks to Deborah Dorff for maintaining our website
Edited by Deborah Dorff
Roosevelt Island Historical Society
SMITHSONIAN AMERICAN ART MUSEUM
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