Kara Walker: Harper's Pictorial History of the Civil War (Annotated)

This exhibition presents Kara Walker's print portfolio, Harper's Pictorial History of the Civil War (Annotated) which includes fifteen large-scale prints created in 2005. The prints contain enlarged reproductions from Harper's Pictorial History of the Civil War, an illustrated compilation of news reports about the Civil War that was first published in 1866. Walker overlays silhouette figures on the illustrations to create a distinctive body of work that encouraged historical reexamination. Now iconic representations, Walker’s silhouettes upset the historical lineage presented in the illustrations and in our classrooms. This presentation of the prints at the Cornell Fine Arts Museum is the culmination of a course taught at Rollins College entitled, Exhibition Difference: Diversity and Visual Culture in the 21st Century. To complement the presentation of the prints by Walker, a few illustrations created about the Civil War by Winslow Homer for Harper’s Weekly from the permanent collection of the Cornell will also be on view.

Kara Walker was born in Stockton, California, in 1969. She received a BFA from the Atlanta College of Art in 1991 and an MFA from the Rhode Island School of Design in 1994. The artist is best known for exploring the complicated intersection of race, gender, and sexuality. Her work has been widely exhibited at museums such as the Museum of Modern Art, New York; San Francisco Museum of Modern Art; Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York; and Whitney Museum of American Art, New York.