ABSTRACT
Until recently, most accounts of modernism in American art have ignored race and minimized region as productive factors. But, as scholars shift from viewing "modernism" as a discrete entity to seeing it as a necessarily relational term, geography—as both literal place and symbolic position—becomes central to our understanding of modernism's protean character. 1 Race tends to deterritorialize difference in one sense, positing biological essences that remain unchanged despite transport across continents and over seas. But because it also imposes social boundaries, race can produce symbolic geographies and actual socialscapes. Thus, it seems useful to consider ways in which being an African-American artist in early- to mid-twentieth-century California placed Sargent Johnson in a unique position in relation to modern art and modern life.
