Psalm
Artist
Whitfield Lovell
(American, b. 1959)
Date1999
MediumCharcoal on wood, radio, audio cassette
DimensionsObject: 40 x 22 x 9 in. (101.6 x 55.9 x 22.9 cm)
ClassificationsSculpture
Credit LineMemphis Brooks Museum of Art purchase; funds provided by Mr. T. Hall Cannon, Elliot Perry, Marina Pacini and David McCarthy, Dr. James Patterson, Dr. Rushton Patterson, Karen Spacek and William Solmson, and Craig Michael Wiener
Object number2005.12a-e
CommentaryWhitfield Lovell draws figures taken from anonymous photographs collected at flea markets and antique stores onto old wood. The portraits are combined with household artifacts such as plates, chairs, or, frying pans to produce deeply moving and dignified images of African Americans from the Jim Crow era. In Psalm, the lovely woman’s head, sketched in charcoal, is blurred and softened, appearing to emanate from the shadows of the wood. Below her, the radio plays a scratchy recording of a hymn. Both the wood panel and the radio are worn from use; they evoke nostalgia for the past as well as conveying a sense of history and the traces of the people who used them.
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