Faith Ringgold
| Faith Ringgold | |
|---|---|
| Born | October 8, 1930 Harlem, New York |
| Nationality | American |
| Field | Painting, Fabric art |
| Training | City College of New York |
Faith Ringgold (born October 8, 1930 in Harlem, New York City) is an African American artist, best known for her painted story quilts. She is professor emeritus in the University of California, San Diego visual art department.
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[edit] Life and artwork
Faith Ringgold was born and raised in Harlem[1] and educated at the City College of New York, where she studied with Robert Gathmey and Yasuo Kuniyoshi. She received an M.A. from the college in 1959. She was greatly influenced by the fabric she worked with at home with her mother, who was a fashion designer, and has used fabric in many of her artworks. She is especially well-known for her painted story quilts which blur the line between "high art" and "craft" by combining painting, quilted fabric, and storytelling.
She modeled her "story quilts" on the Buddhist Thangkas, lovely pictures painted on fabric and quilted or brocaded, which could then be easily rolled up and transported. She has influenced numerous modern artists, including Linda Freeman, and known some of the greatest African American artists personally, including Romare Bearden, Jacob Lawrence, and Betye Saar.
Her work is in the permanent collection of many museums including the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Museum of Modern Art, and other museums, mostly in New York City.
In addition, Ringgold has written and illustrated seventeen children's books.[2] Her first book, Tar Beach, won the Coretta Scott King Award for Illustration.[3]
Ringgold is represented by ACA Gallery.
On January 16, 2012 for Martin Luther King Jr. Day, she had a Google Doodle featured on Google's home page.
[edit] Activism
Ringgold has been an activist since the 1970s, participating in several feminist, anti-racist organizations. In 1970, Ringgold, fellow artist Poppy Johnson, and art critic Lucy Lippard, founded the Ad Hoc Women's Art Committee and protested the Whitney Annual, a major art exhibition held at the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York.[3] Members of the committee demanded that women artists account for fifty percent of the exhibitors and created disturbances at the museum by leaving raw eggs and sanitary napkins on its grounds and by gathering to sing, blow whistles, and chant about their exclusion.[3] That same year, Ringgold and her daughter, the writer Michele Wallace, founded Women Students and Artists for Black Art Liberation (WSABAL).[4] Around 1974, Ringgold and Wallace were founding members of the National Black Feminist Organization.[5] Ringgold was also a founding member of the "Where We At" Black Women Artists, a New York-based women art collective associated with the Black Arts Movement.[6]
[edit] Copyright suit against BET
Ringgold was also the plaintiff in a significant copyright case, Ringgold v. Black Entertainment Television.[7] Black Entertainment Television (BET) had aired several episodes of the television series Roc in which a Ringgold poster was shown on nine different occasions for a total of 26.75 seconds. Ringgold sued for copyright infringement. The court found BET liable for copyright infringement, rejecting the de minimis defense raised by BET, which had argued that the use of Ringgold's copyrighted work was so minimal that it did not constitute an infringement.
[edit] In popular culture
- A new elementary and middle school in Hayward, California, Faith Ringgold School K-8, was named after her in 2007.
[edit] Painting of Faith Ringgold
- Faith Ringgold, 1976 painting by Alice Neel
[edit] Publications by Faith Ringgold
- Tar Beach, Crown Publishing Company, New York, New York, 1991. ISBN 978-0517885444
- Aunt Harriet's Underground Railroad in the Sky, Random House, Crown Publishers, New York, New York. ISBN 978-0517885437
- Dinner at Aunt Connie’s House, Hyperion Books For Children, New York, New York. ISBN 978-0590137133
- We Flew Over The Bridge: Memoirs of Faith Ringgold, Little, Brown and Company, Boston, Mass., 1995, Duke University Press, Durham, NC, 2005. ISBN 978-0822335641
- Talking To Faith Ringgold, by Faith Ringgold, Linda Freeman and Nancy Roucher, Crown Books for Young Readers, New York, New York, 1996. ISBN 978-0517709146
- 7 Passages To A Flight, an artist’s book, Brighton Press, San Diego, California.
- Bonjour Lonnie, Hyperion Books for Young Readers, New York, NY, 1996. ISBN 978-0786800766
- My Dream of Martin Luther King, Crown Books for Young Readers, New York, NY. ISBN 978-0517885772
- The Invisible Princess, Crown Books for Young Readers, New York, NY. ISBN 978-0440417354
- If a Bus Could Talk, Simon and Schuster, New York, NY, 1999. ISBN 978-0689856761
- Counting to Tar Beach, Crown, New York, NY, 2000. ISBN 978-0517800225
- Cassie's Colorful Day, Crown, New York, NY, 2000. ISBN 978-0517800218
- Cassie's Word Quilt, Crown, New York, NY, 2001. ISBN 978-0553112337
- O Holy Night: Christmas with the Boys Choir of Harlem, Harper Collins, New York, 2004. ISBN 978-1422355121
- The Three Witches by Zora Neale Hurston illustrated by Faith Ringgold, Harper Collins, 2005. ISBN 978-0060006495
- Bronzeville Boys and Girls (poetry) by Gwendolyn Brooks illustrated by Faith Ringgold Harper Collins, NYC, 2007. ISBN 978-0060295059
- What Will You Do for Peace? Impact of 9/11 on New York City Youth, InterRelations Collaborative, Inc., 2004. ISBN 978-0976175308
[edit] Awards
- 2009: Met with President Barack Obama for Peace Corps award
- 2006: Harlem Arts alliance Golden Legacy Visual Arts Award
- 2006: James A. Porter Colloquium on African American Art Honoree
- 2005: Amistad Center for Art & Culture Presidents Award
- 2005: Moore College of Art and Design’s Visionary Women Award
- 2004: National Visionary Leadership Project
- 2002: California Art Educators Association Living Artists Award
- 2001: Dedicators Award 10/27/01
- 2001: Art Institute of Chicago, May 19, 2001
- 2000: Mary Grove College, Honorary Art Degree
- 1999: NAACP Image Award
- 1999 :Art alliance (Scholastic) April 13, 1999
- 1999: CITYarts "Making a Difference Through the Arts" Award, June 21, 1999
- 1999: Bank Street, May 27, 1999
- 1995 :Townsend Harris Medal City College of New York Alumni Association
[edit] References
- ^ Zimmer, William (14 April 2002). "ART; Politics With Subtlety, On Quilts and in Books". New York Times. http://select.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=F30D10FD3B590C778DDDAD0894DA404482.
- ^ http://faithringgold.blogspot.com/2007/11/2.html
- ^ a b c "Brooklyn Museum". Faith Ringgold. https://www.brooklynmuseum.org/eascfa/feminist_art_base/gallery/Faith_Ringgold.php. Retrieved October 18, 2011.
- ^ Norma Broude and Mary D. Garrard, ed (1994). The Power of Feminist Art. Harry N. Abrams, Inc.. p. 142. ISBN 0-8109-3732-8.
- ^ http://www.blackculturalstudies.org/wallace/hellandback.html
- ^ Brown, Kay. “The Emergence of Black Women Artists: The 1970s, New York.” International Review of African American Art. Vol. 15, no 1, 1998 (45-52)
- ^ Ringgold v. Black Entertainment Television, 126 F.3d 70 (2nd Cir. 1997).
[edit] External links
- Faith Ringgold's site
- Faith Ringgold's blog
- Barbara Faith Company blog - Everything about Faith Ringgold.
- Faith Ringgold's oral history video excerpts at The National Visionary Leadership Project
- Faith Ringgold on DVD, at work, her inspiration and craft Films about Faith Ringgold by Linda Freeman, L&S Video
- Faith Ringgold Society An organization devoted to the study of the life and work Faith Ringgold
