ABSTRACT
Resonance, a term often used in discussions of visual expression, signals a connection to multi-sensorial reverberations felt deep within the body. Among the forms of artistic expression to which Catlett looked for inspiration, resonant wellsprings for her were the pre-Hispanic arts of Mexico and the art of sub-Saharan Africa. When Catlett visited museums such as the Smithsonian National Museum of African Art—a museum she lauded as one that Black people visit the way that white people visit the Metropolitan Museum—or perused published reproductions of African art, what mattered to her was how meaning is expressed through form—what she called “form that would achieve sympathy.” Catlett’s figurative sculpture counters the historical objectification of Black women’s bodies and claims space for Black women’s embodied subjectivity. Catlett’s later figurative sculpture represents passionate, determined, resilient women who stride forward with confidence and gesture expansively.
