Symbolism

Kara Walker, an artist that exposes the impossibility of moral absolutes within the dynamics of domination, a predicament that Kara uses in her art and that deals with racism, sexism, and the overall horror of slavery and plantation life; such as slave hunts, mutilations, rape, and murder. Kara Walker’s art illuminates certain allegorical meanings, philosophical associations, and visual references and through years of misrepresentation of the African American race, she uses stereotypes, contradictions, and acts of brutality in her artworks as these underlying subjects in which this glossary of symbols for example; hoop skirts, boots, shoes, knives, razor blades, Ropes, water, birth, and breast milk that makes up Kara Walker silhouettes.  

The Hoop skirt, a symbol of mortality and the typical fashion statement of southern women before the civil war, is very present in Walker’s imagery in depicting both the mistresses as well as the slaves, not necessarily to protect their virtue, but to disguise their own repressed desires.(1) The antebellum plantation is the first experiment of Walker ‘s in which she uses depictions that establishes not only the historical and geographical references, but also a psychological terrain in which the cast shadows of masters and slaves embody the repressed prejudices, desires, and obsessions that the contemporary American (black or white) refuses to acknowledge, visualize, and resolve.(1)

 “ Like clothing, footwear carries symbolic potency and poetry in walker’s imagery, helping to expose complex connections and reveal hidden plots and desires.”- Yasmil Raymond. (1) Some situations the boots mean some form of an affectionate relationship in others a sense of defiance.

Mutilations, murders, and suicides are common occurrences in Walker’s fantasized version of antebellum south. Where masters, mistresses, and slave alike afflict their deepest internal conflicts upon one another.(1) When Walker depicts children as executioners, she spear to the manner in which their unspoiled honesty, or innocence absolves them from maliciousness, to the point of being almost self defensive.(1)

Images of ships, tidal waves washtubs, and sea monster in Walker’s work are reference to the transatlantic encounters between the European and Africans. The association between the brutal violence of the transatlantic slave trade and the dangers of the deep water are both represented in Walker’s artwork. (1)

            “Infants and toddlers appear in a multiplicity of vulnerable situations, falling lifeless to the ground, dangling from delicate umbilical cords, or clinging to a mother breast”- Yasmil Raymond .(1)  Symbolically, birth connotes origin. The representation of birth encapsulates not only self- preservation but also self- destruction. During slavery, breeding was a method of control, for the slave women to be bred; abortion was a sign of rebellion, a powerful gesture of revolt against the “system”. Walker’s allegorical figures of men giving birth to fetuses attached to their umbilical cords symbolized that an odd motherhood experience. Instead of the vagina in which a female has the male has to give birth through his anus. The newborns are sadly lifeless and are falling to the ground, but to have the man become a surrogate is a sign of surrender and evokes the forced denial of parenthood and family ancestor under slavery.

Similar to that of the boots and footwear the defecating in public is a sign of obscenity, disobedience and defiance. And also symbolize the vulnerability and weakness of the African American. (1)

Some Slave women served as nursemaids to the mistress’ children and some as birth mothers of the masters’ illegitmate children. Procreation was crucial in the mechanisms and calculations of the plantations slavery in the south. There are several depictions of breastfeeding that inspire association with nourishment and motherhood or in some cases fatherhood, as well as affirming the lineage that slaves were denied, and considering that the”… Ancestry is the fluid that flows in Walker’s breastfeeding imagery…” the use of this imagery really hits home to African Americans who can not trace the heritage back generations and generations (1).

Through and through Kara walker’s erotic, disturbing, and slightly nauseating imagery hold so much more meaning than what meets the eye, and the symbols she uses are utilized to evoke that nauseating feeling. And to think that its all done through the use of black paper and silhouettes and a little bit of detail, and the audiences own mind to have the whole come together is awe- inspiring.

-Komikka Patton

BIbliography

1.Vergne, Philippe. Kara Walker My Complement, My Enemy, My Oppressor, My Love : [catalog of an Exhibition at the Walker Art Center, Minn., Minnesota, Feb. 17-May 13, 2007 ; ARC Musée D'art Moderne De La Ville De Paris, June 19 - September 9, 2007 ; Whitney Museum of American Art, NY, Nov. 11, 2007-Feb. 3, 2008 ; UCLA Hammer Museum, Los Angeles, Calif., Feb. 17-May 11, 2008]. Minneapolis: Walker Art Center, 2007. Print.

Kara Walker’s lack of color, absorption of all the colors compiled into silhouettes, BLACK paper on a WHITE walls, inspired me, provoked me, and stirred something in me, to create this piece. Her stereotypical, grotesque, overly sexual, and deeply disturbing images motivated me to look deeper than just black on white literally and figuratively. I took her idea of using simple materials and black paper, and the white of the paper, with another touch of graphite and produced a Kara Walker look alike with a grey scale twist. Although the situation being depicted in my piece is “Black on Black” the sexual atmosphere is still present with the absence of the explicit and erotic details that she put forward. Walker’s idea that the audience would tell the story in there own mind, considering everything is black, enthused me to use that same idea to tell a story about my own family member who, although was not put in the same situations as the slaves, she was used in a sexual way by someone with a sense of domination over her.  Kara Walker’s idea seemed like a perfect fit to help tell my story.

-Komikka Patton