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Dreams No. 2
1965
Jacob Lawrence
Born: Atlantic City, New Jersey 1917
Died: Seattle, Washington 2000
tempera on fiberboard
35 3/4 x 24 in. (90.8 x 61.0 cm.)
Smithsonian American Art Museum
Gift of the Sara Roby Foundation
1986.6.95
Smithsonian American Art Museum
2nd Floor, North Wing
"Composing is most important. I seem to gravitate to geometric forms. It is like opening a book of geometry; I may not understand the formula but I love the beauty of line." Lawrence, in Rago, "A Welcome from Jacob Lawrence," School Arts, 1963
Jacob Lawrence was inspired by the women in his Harlem neighborhood. Like his own mother, they worked hard to support their families and survived on very little money. In this painting a girl rests on a chair in front of two large windows. In one, a tall, elegant lady stands with a bouquet of flowers and in the other, a bride and groom dance and throw confetti. Windows and doorways were focal points of New York's brownstone neighborhoods, creating a link to life on the streets outside. But the bride and groom are clearly in a landscape beyond the city, and in this sense the windows have become screens onto which the young woman projects her fantasies.
For more information about this work visit the Luce Foundation Center.
Keywords
Architecture Interior - detail - window
Ceremony - wedding
Ethnic - African-American
Fantasy
Figure female - full length
State of being - phenomenon - dream
painting
paint - tempera
fiberboard
About Jacob Lawrence
Born: Atlantic City, New Jersey 1917 Died: Seattle, Washington 2000
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