What does it mean to be a Black woman in the United States of America? This question, and its complicated answers, is central to the work of the African American and Mexican sculptor and printmaker Elizabeth Catlett (1915–2012). Informed by the contemporary concept of the “StrongBlackWoman” (SBW) trope, or stereotype, this exhibition explores the many ways in which Black women, as depicted in Catlett’s work, have overcome barriers in their public and private lives.
Born and raised in the United States and ultimately resettling in Mexico, Elizabeth Catlett spent much of her career teaching and mentoring Brown and Black youth in addition to her printmaking and sculpting practice. Throughout her life, she dedicated herself to creating empowering and varied depictions of Black women and their experiences, seen most notably The Black Woman series, exhibited in full in this gallery. Using the lens of the SBW, viewers can begin to question and challenge initial readings of and assumptions about Catlett’s Black women and Black women in society, all while considering the impact of influences such as intergenerational trauma (that which is passed from one generation to the next) and epigenetics (how one’s environment and behaviors can cause genetic changes) on Black women’s bodies and minds.
