Writers Who Teach, Teachers Who Write
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© 2021CHARLES ALSTON / ARTISTS RIGHTS SOCIETY (ARS), NEW YORK
Pressing machine added more heat to the room pressure from top, hiss of steam underneath buttons, lace, sequins stitched back in place wedding dresses carefully wrapped in tissue for storage silky evening gowns, cashmere coats hung on tall racks rolled out front where Mama smiled, tagged clothing talked to customers, wrote sales slips. She grew fond of the workers, heard their stories met their families, told me The world’s a big place people come in all shapes all sizes all colors but inside we’re the same.
Woman Washing Clothes, 1970 (pastel on paper, 30.5x20.5) by Charles Alston, in the Permanent Collection of the Harvey B. Gantt Center for African-American Arts + Culture Generously donated by Bank of America Corporation
3 In the First Baptist Church on Main Street first graders sang ‘Jesus loves the little children, all the children of the world, red and yellow black and white, they are precious in His sight . . .’ The Girl’s Auxiliary raised money for missionaries in Africa to spread the Word, save souls, promise them heaven but at a meeting about desegregating the church the head deacon, a leader in town, stood up, raised his fist, shouted I’ll walk out the back door if a Negro ever sets foot inside the front door. The meeting ended like all the others with 1st Corinthians 16:14 Let all that you do be done in love, and then, we sang a gospel hymn one of Dora’s favorites she sang in my grandmother’s kitchen.
North Carolina native CHARLES HENRY ALSTON (1907–1977) moved with his family to New York at the age of seven, but spent summers with his grandmother in Charlotte. He earned a BA from Columbia University and an MFA from Columbia’s Teaching College. He was an influential painter, sculptor, educator, and prominent figure of the Harlem Renaissance. He was the first African American supervisor for the Works Progress Administration and founder of the Harlem Artists Guild. His art appears in the collections of the Harvey B. Gantt Center for African American Arts + Culture, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and the Whitney Museum of American Art.
