Awakening of Africa

Richmond Barthé (1901 – 1989)

Bronze, 1959

As Black Americans gained greater access to education and opportunity after the Civil War, artists and writers began to emerge who expressed pride in both their African lineage and their growing list of accomplishments. Among the most significant of these was sculptor Richmond Barthé. While Barthé spent most of his early life in New Orleans and the major part of his career in New York, Awakening of Africa belongs to the later period of Barthé’s life when he lived in Jamaica. A major contributor to the Harlem Renaissance, Barthé is best known for his portrayal of Black subjects, upon whom he focused on the diversity and spirituality of man. Barthé once said, “All my life I have been interested in trying to capture the spiritual quality I see and feel in people, and I feel that the human figure as God made it, is the best means of expressing this spirit in man.”