Black Excellence Month: Kara Walker

Kara Walker
(b. 1969)

First appearing into the art scene in 1994, Walker has had no less than 40 solo exhibitions, and many other honors such as the MacArthur Fellowship in 1997 (at the age of 28) and a nomination by Time magazine as one of "100 Most Influential People in The World of Artists and Entertainers." One of her most notable and profound pieces is "Kara Walker: My Complement, My Enemy, My Oppressor, My Love" It depicts the silhouetted forms of slaves and white masters engaging in cannibalistic as well as sadomasochistic depravity. This piece is room-sized and controversial to many.

She has portrayed what many others are either too afraid to say or just simply do not see. Her mediums are her signature silhouettes, including drawing, painting, colored-light projections, writing, shadow puppetry, and, most recently, film animation. She has an ability to reanimate the flat, cardboard characters of stealth history and it is best seen in the over five dozen watercolor, colored pencil, and graphite works on paper collectively titled Do You Like Creme in Your Coffee and Chocolate in Your Milk? (1997), hung somewhere near the middle of the exhibition.