Faith Ringgold - painter Faith Ringgold continues her American People Series - excerpt from the publication 'Art on Fire: The Politics of Race and Sex in the Paintings of Faith Ringgold'

American Visions, Oct, 1999 by Lisa Farrington

The racial tensions and disparities that were the fabric of African-American existence became the subject of Ringgold's first mature works, entitled American People. Painted in a manner termed by the artist "super realism," the American People Series was rendered in a heavily outlined "cloisonniste" style, not unlike that which Ringgold had experimented with in Provincetown. In this series, Ringgold's formal and thematic objectives were decidedly political, as she explains:

   That summer of 1963 was the beginning of my mature work. I planned to paint
   five paintings in my new style.... The idea was to make a statement in my
   art about the Civil Rights Movement and what was happening to black people
   at that time.

The "super realist" method was intended to enhance the political and psychological content of the series through the use of stark imagery and a vivid palette. With American People, Ringgold embarked upon a creative journey that would soon gain her a reputation as one of the most political and consistently candid artists of recent American history.

The American People Series includes images of social satire and isolation, depicting the middle-class African American as a lonely figure, playing an unnatural role in a hostile environment. As curator and art historian Mary Schmidt Campbell points out, this series attacks "the social pretensions and hypocrisies of black and white Americans, and the bogus camaraderie of integration." Literary historian Linda Dittmar similarly describes the attempts of persons of color to assimilate into white society as being akin to a journey into chaos and emptiness. Though such qualities cannot be said to have marked every attempt at integration in the 1960s, they are the characteristics that Ringgold's series most often reflects.

Ringgold tells us that her visual interpretation of these turbulent times was inspired by James Baldwin, who had just published The Fire Next Time. Says Ringgold:

   I read feverishly, especially everything that James Baldwin had written on
   relationships between blacks and whites in America. Baldwin understood, I
   felt, the disparity between black and white people as well as anyone.

Baldwin's influence on the American People Series can be traced to the essay from The Fire Next Time, "My Dungeon Shook." In this treatise Baldwin describes American urban centers such as Harlem as "cities of destruction," wherein persons of color were intended to perish. Those who, like Ringgold, chose to venture outside of the "cities of destruction," were warned by Baldwin to be suspicious of words like "acceptance" and "integration"--words suggesting that African Americans should become as much like whites as possible, so that they might more readily be accepted into American society. For Baldwin and for Ringgold this was an unattainable goal--an African American, no matter what the effort, could never actually become white and would never be perceived as such by anyone.

The American People Series illustrates Baldwin's ironic view of the African-American bourgeoisie and its attempts to assimilate into white society. The first of some twenty paintings in the series, "Between Friends," depicts two women--one African-American, the other Caucasian--coming face-to-face in a tightly compressed setting composed of two rectangular spaces or entryways. The broad red door jamb serves effectively to separate the two women even as it facilitates their meeting. The white American woman presents to us a stern, implacable profile, while the African-American woman looks questioningly into her companion's shadowy eyes, slightly smiling, as if hopeful that a friendship might be forged.

In her own relationships with white women, Ringgold could sense the invisible racial chasm that separated them, and she tried to capture this feeling in "Between Friends." During the summer of 1963, the artist was the guest of wealthy acquaintances who owned a home in the interracial, upper middle-class community of Oak Bluffs, Massachusetts. These friends, Dr. and Mrs. Goldsberry of Wooster, hosted weekly poker parties, which featured a high-powered group of socialites. The whites in the group treated Ringgold with a kind of formal courtesy that lacked the warmth of genuine friendship. The hard-edged, figurative style of the American People Series was ideal for representing the stiff formality and psychological tension of these interracial encounters.

Curator Terrie Rouse observes that the African Americans depicted in the series appear to be in a state of shock as they participate in "unwilling interactions" with their white counterparts. Indeed, these figures have the formal rigidity of mannequins, awkwardly posed in a tight, shallow space. Ringgold's use of form to emphasize content is explored further by Moira Roth. In her essay, "Keeping the Feminist Faith," Roth describes the painting "Between Friends" as a representation of "the distribution of power in America," emphasized by the barrier (the painted door frame) that divides these two middle class women. The door frame symbolizes the social impediments that prevent women of different races from sharing genuine friendship. Roth also notes that the original title of the work was "The Wall Between Friends," which underscores the relationship between the theme of the painting and the symbolic configuration of its pictorial space.