As you look at the artwork in this exercise try to understand what messages the artists are conveying about the great migration. Why were blacks leaving the South? Were they being pushed or pulled? What was the state of mind of the migrants? Desperate? Hopeful? How were they received in their new home—by blacks already there? By white Northerners? Did they improve their condition by moving north? What was better about life in the North? What might they have missed about the South? How did the new arrivals adjust? What was the role of various institution in North: families, church, schools, the black press. To what extent was African American society in the North unified? Divided by class or other social distinctions? Is the migration connected more to Du Bois's militant protest ideology or Washington's doctrine of stoic uplift and self-help.
Answer as many of these questions as you can by just looking at the pictures. Later we'll do some reading on the Great Migration to fill in the blanks.
The Migration Series by Jacob Lawrence. Lawrence made these paintings in 1940-41 to tell the story of the mass African migration from the South which began in 1915 and would continue to about 1970. You can see the series, along with Lawrence's captions at this site. Choose the yellow tab.
http://www.phillipscollection.org/migration_series/index.cfm
The South: The Gleaners by John Biggers, 1943
William Edouard Scott, Workers in Field, 1940
Malvin Gray Johnson, Brothers, 1934
Aaron Douglas, whose iconic work is most often associated with the Jazz Age and Harlem Renaissance.
Robert Blackburn, People in a Boat, 1939. What statement does this lithograph seem to be making about the migration? Where are they going? Why is one character reaching into the water? Where are they coming from? Is this telling a story of hope or despair? Or both?
The Harp (Lift Every Voice) by Augusta Savage, 1939.