ABSTRACT
The main aim of my essay is to highlight the struggle of what we may call, for the sake of this conference, the "black immigrant artist," and in so doing I will draw your attention to its socio-historical as well as ideological importance for postwar British society. I use the tvord "immigrant" instead of "migrant" because of the special constraints and restrictions which black or Afro-Asian artists in particular face in their freedom of movement in the West. However, a word of caution would be useful before we proceed further. Under consideration here is not what some people call "black art"—a term which, in my view, should anly apply to works produced by black artists which specifically reflect their social experiences vis-à-vis racism. I'm not suggesting that the experience of racism has been confined to some artists and that others escaped from it. But only some artists, particularly of a younger generation who were born in Britain, and who experienced racism while growing up, allowed this experience to be explicitly part of their work. If I use the term "black" or "Afro-Asian," it is only to emphasize the racial divisions that still exist in our society today, and which continue to define the role and status of the non-white artist. I use these terms contingently, and without invoking any essential ethnic or racial differences, and I look forward to the day when there will be no need to make distinctions between white and black artists.
