ART WRITING & CURATORIAL FELLOWSHIP Black Victorians by Marjorie Bontemps
Installation view of Black Victorians at TAC Gallery, April 2019.
It is the role of a black artist to make the invisible be visible. When history failed to narrate black culture during the early 19th century, Tulsa artist Charica Daugherty decided to right that omission by painting 19th century notable figures in the monumental exhibition called Black Victorians. Installed in the Tulsa Artist Coalition (TAC) Gallery, the series features twenty paintings by Daugherty inspired by photographs of black men and women living in the Victorian era. The presence of blackness in this exhibition, like the portrait of the Black Prince, who poses majestically with a background of the London Tower, offers viewers the opportunity to reconsider the place and the social dynamics of blacks during the Victorian age. Daugherty’s exhibition invariably stirs new dialogue on the subject of black culture during that era and how it is reflected in today’s representation of black people globally. Daugherty came up with the idea for Black Victorians while doing some research for
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her master’s degree at Oklahoma State University in Teaching Learning with an emphasis in Curriculum. While browsing the internet, Daugherty stumbled upon some historical photographs and stories of black Americans and Europeans in the 19th and early 20th centuries. Although TAC has shown work by other black artists dealing with black subjects, this show ignites some thought-provoking interest and curiosity in viewers. Visitors were struck by the mere fact of seeing these portraits of black Victorians and of black Americans. When we see portrayals from this time period, we generally do not see black individuals represented; when we do, we might see them as servants, slaves, or otherwise in the service of white narratives. In short, we see them through the lens of the systematic oppression imposed on blacks throughout history, rather than as agents of their own narratives, as social leaders or accumulators of actual or cultural capital. Daugherty corrects this lacuna in representation, and in her paintings, we can see how each portrait show the
extensiveness of what blacks in the Victorian era looked like. This series reiterates the artist’s desire for society not to view individuals through the social construct of race. Her interest in creating figurative painting has evolved as an emerging artist. She delights in the pleasure of inventing new color palettes to get the right tone of “brown” onto the canvas. In Woman in Red Turban, for example, all the elements—facial expression, lines and movements depicted on the turban, the color structure of her face—work together to convey the subject’s humanity. There is a sense of self awareness, pride, and intelligence that emanates from each portrait. Selika Lazevski—The French Equestrian emphasizes pleasure and the construction of self. By depicting Lazevski holding her riding stick with both hands, Daugherty validates her right to participate in the equestrian sport as a black Victorian woman. The force of this painting represents the many dimensions of what