Blackberry Woman

Richmond Barthé, Blackberry Woman, modeled by 1930, cast 1932, bronze, 35 ¹⁄₂ x 12 ¹⁄₄ x 16 ¹⁄₄ in. (90.1 x 31.1 x 41.3 cm), Smithsonian American Art Museum, Museum purchase through the Luisita L. and Franz H. Denghausen Endowment, 2001.6

Artwork Details

Title: Blackberry Woman
Artist: Richmond Barthé
Date: modeled by 1930, cast 1932
Location: Not on view
Dimensions: 35 ¹⁄₂ x 12 ¹⁄₄ x 16 ¹⁄₄ in. (90.1 x 31.1 x 41.3 cm)
Credit Line: Museum purchase through the Luisita L. and Franz H. Denghausen Endowment
Mediums Description: bronze
Classifications: Sculpture
Highlights: African American Art
Subjects: African American
Figure female — full length
Occupation — domestic — gathering
Object — other — basket
Object Number: 2001.6
Linked Open Data: https://edan.si.edu/saam/id/object/2001.6

Artwork Description

The angular grace of Blackberry Woman speaks of stoicism and constancy. The subject – an African American woman in a simple dress who is balancing a basket on her head – is one Barthé may well have seen on market day as a boy growing up in Bay St. Louis, Mississippi. But she is more than an echo of an image once observed. She has the frontal, linear form found in West African sculpture, which Barthé first saw in Chicago, in an exhibition during “The Negro in Art Week” in November 1927, when he was a student at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago.

African American Art: Harlem Renaissance, Civil Rights Era, and Beyond, 2012