Connecting the Visual to the Verbal in the Classroom

Background

The Harlem Renaissance

After I am comfortable with the students' level of understanding regarding the viewing of artwork, I introduce them to the Harlem Renaissance, the time period which will be the focus of much of the unit. This movement, which lasted from the twenties into the early forties, was one of the most significant groundswells culturally that any group of people have achieved in this country. In Beloved Harlem; a Literary Tribute to Black America's Most Famous Neighborhood, William Banks characterizes the beginning of the movement as "a stellar, singular roll of time in which the generations of blacks born in the wake of the Civil War descended on an unpopular plot of real estate in upper New York City and commenced to making a bit of heaven for themselves. ²" And it was a bit of heaven, for as African Americans flocked to New York in search of a dream and an identity, figures such as Louis Armstrong, Count Basie, Romare Bearden and Langston Hughes led an incredible cultural revolution that would shape not only the future of African American culture, but the future of American writing, music and art as well.

There are several ways to introduce the Harlem Renaissance to students, but one way that I have found rewarding is to allow the students to make their own discoveries. After a brief discussion about what the word "Renaissance" means, I allow my students to go onto the internet to explore the period themselves. In a sort of internet treasure hunt, students find out about the period, the dates, the figures in music, in art, in literature. They gather the background knowledge needed to go ahead with the unit. (See the appendix for the "Harlem Renaissance Treasure Hunt Worksheet.") This is actually a good strategy to use when introducing any new information to students. Whenever possible, teachers should allow students to find information on their own, on the internet or in the library. Students feel a sense of accomplishment and are more likely to retain the information which they have gained on their own

Visual Artists of the Harlem Renaissance

The three artists of the Harlem Renaissance that I will focus on in this unit are Jacob Lawrence, William H. Johnson, and Romare Bearden. Of course there are plenty of other artists that teachers can focus on, including Aaron Douglas, Palmer Hayden, James Van Der Zee, and others, but I chose these artists specifically for several reasons.

Jacob Lawrence's painting, like the poetry of Langston Hughes, is extremely accessible to students in Middle school. Using bright colors and sharp angles, Lawrence's paintings are reminiscent of comic books, or the graphic novel. The historical panels that he is famous for are visual lectures on figures who make up a sort of "who's who" of middle school history books: The Life of Frederick Douglas (41 panels); The Life of Harriet Tubman (40 panels); The Migration of the Negro Northwards (60 panels); or the life of Toussaint L' Ouverture (41 panels). ³ Lawrence becomes a visual historian or a teacher through these incredible works of art. Students will also see their own lives in the simple subject matter chosen by Lawrence in his other work. Works such as "Brownstones," "Barbershop," "Parade," "Home Chores" and "Library" examine African American life through simple, everyday images that students will be able to relate to on many levels.

While much of William H. Johnson's work seems simplistic, even "primitive" as he himself once called it, this artist's work was significant. His earlier works focused on depictions of African Americans in religious scenes. It is not unusual to see a black Jesus or Mary in these pieces. Later in his career, much as in Lawrence's historical series, Johnson focused on heroic or historical figures such as Frederick Douglass in his paintings. But it is his mid career, when Johnson focused on the simple depiction of the plight of the African American, that will be utilized in this unit. David Driskell in The Flowering of the Harlem Renaissance: The Art of Aaron Douglas, Meta Warrick Fuller, Palmer Hayden, and William H. Johnson comments on the importance of Johnson's work, asserting that Johnson rejected common elitist views of art and worked to "develop an awareness of the social plight of Black people in America," setting out to enlighten the "Black Community about their own history and heritage." ⁴ Students will find Johnson's use of bright colors and two dimensional, flat artwork perhaps too simple at first, reminding them of their own work or that of their classmates, but partly for this very reason his paintings are exactly the type of artwork that students will find easy to relate to and write about.

The same, in regard to middle school students' accessibility, can be said of Romare Bearden. Famous for his collages, Bearden will inspire students and provide a new medium to focus on when writing ecphrastically. A host of Bearden images appear on the National Gallery of Arts homepage at the time of this writing. Among the images I intend to use in the unit are "Black Manhattan," "Card Players," "Childhood," and "Madeline Jones' Wonderful garden, 1977." These images will increase the students' understanding of the way art depicts everyday life and the different mediums used by artists.

Langston Hughes

Langston Hughes was the voice of the Harlem Renaissance. More than any other writer of the time, Langston Hughes came to represent the period. Many of my students have heard of Hughes, who really "helped to define the spirit of the age." ⁵ He is a favorite among the writers of the period for many reasons, and is especially helpful in this unit, much like the painters mentioned above, owing to his accessibility.

Hughes's career took off after one year at Columbia University with the 1921 publication of "The Negro Speaks of Rivers" in the Crisis, a publication born of the Harlem Renaissance. James Smethwurth comments in Lyric Stars: Countee Cullen and Langston Hughes that Hughes's free verse poems, including "The Negro Speaks of Rivers," are "vehicles for Hughes' deepest musings on the nature of African American identity and its historical, cultural and spiritual connections to Africa." ⁶ Much as Lawrence and Johnson were using their paintings to raise awareness as to the plight of the African American, so too did Hughes begin to sing the sad song of a "dream deferred." In 1926 the poet published his first collection of poems, The Weary Blues, the first to use the blues form in poetry. ⁷ Hughes experimented with voice and vernacular in many of the blues pieces including "Homesick Blues" (Da railroad bridge's/A sad song in de air ll1–2), the "Po' Boy Blues" (I's so weary/I wish I'd never been born. ll 22–23) as well as "Mother to Son" (Well, son, I'll tell you;/Life for me ain't been no crystal stair. ll1–2) Hughes is identifying the African American experience through the use of speech. As with the stroke of a brush Hughes is painting the African American voice as part of a cultural identity. Smethurst comments, "Hughes' vernacular pieces make plain their identity as speech, generally either a folk monologue or song." ⁸

Much as students will look to Walter Dean Myers' Harlem for examples of imagery in their poetry, they will look to Langston Hughes for lessons on persona or voice and line breaks in free verse.

While there are numerous other writers that could be utilized for an examination of the poetry of the Harlem Renaissance, the lack of ecphrastc poetry from the period is surprising. Examples of Harlem Renaissance poets writing about the visual arts are almost non–existent. There are examples, which I will use in the unit, of modern poets writing about the art of the period, but not contemporaries. On the other hand, poets and writers writing about music and the emergence of jazz during this time period is not lacking and would make a complete teaching unit of its own. The ecphrastic section of this unit mostly focuses on my students' attempt to bridge this gap. Langston Hughes steps in to remind us of the technique of writing poetry and provides examples for mini lessons, but the focus of the unit is really on the art of the period and my students writing of ecphrastic poetry based on that art.