Accession Number
2006/1.96

Title
Malcolm X Speaks for Us

Artist(s)
Elizabeth Catlett

Artist Nationality
American (North American)

Object Creation Date
1969

Medium & Support
linoleum cut on paper

Dimensions
( )

Credit Line
Gift of Elizabeth Catlett

Subject matter
This print shows a portrait of Malcom X, in black, surrounded by images of African-American women.  The portrait along the top of the print comes from an earlier print of the artist's entitled "I am the Negro Woman" (1949), memorializing the oppression of African-American women.  The images of the woman in the middle of the work come from a print entitled "Negro Es Bello II" (1969), which likens the faces of African-American women to Nigerian sculptures.  The image along the bottom may depict Angela Davis, with whom the artist created the Mexican Provisional Committee of Solidarity, and for whom she created the poster "Freedom for Angela Davis" in the same year. 

Physical Description
This print is composed of sets of faces in three registers.  Along the top, in a black stripe, is a repeated, closely cropped image of a woman's face looking to the left.  In the middle left are five repeated images in shades of brown of a woman's face looking right, toward the face of a man in black.  Along the bottom are three large images of a woman's face in green, brown and blue.

Primary Object Classification
Print

Collection Area
Modern and Contemporary

Rights
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Keywords
African American
Malcolm X
civil rights
leaders (people)
portraits