faith ringgold - art in the classroom february...

Updated February 1, 2016

Faith Ringgold 1930 – present

Narrative Quilting

In the vertical art storage rack you will find the following reproduction and posters: Large reproductions: The Sunflowers Quilting Bee at Arles Matisse’s Chapel Dancing at the Louvre Church Picnic Posters: • The Art Elements & Principles posters to use in the discussion In the black cabinet you will find a white binder with a copy of this presentation. The books Aunt Harriett’s Underground Railroad in the Sky, and Dinner at Aunt Connie’s House

Faith Ringgold

Art in the Classroom North Stratfield School

Personal Information Name: Faith Ringgold Born: October 8, 1930 Lived: Faith Ringgold was born in Harlem, New York. Her father drove a truck for the

sanitation department while her mother raised Faith and her two siblings, a brother and a sister, before becoming a fashion designer in the 1940’s.

Family: Ringgold is married to Burdette Ringgold. They have two daughters and three granddaughters.

Professional Information

Type of artist: Painter, quilter, writer.

Style: Ringgold developed the story quilt painting, an art form in which she combines her

love of painting with quilt making. These story quilts are paintings with fabric borders sewn around them. Ringgold then writes the accompanying story on the fabric border. These painted story quilts are about the size of a blanket for a full-sized bed, but are intended to be hung on the wall as a painting.

FamousWorks: Church Picnic (the work we are highlighting), Dancing at the Louvre, The

Quilting Bee at Arles (we also have this to show the children), Matisse’s Chapel

Artistic Credo: A sense of hope and optimism run through Ringgold’s work. A recurrent theme in her work is that people can change and even the world can change through the will of people to make the world a better place.

Artist’s Backgrounds Faith Ringgold was born in 1930 in Harlem, a neighborhood in New York City. Ringgold suffered from asthma as a child and frequently had to stay home from school. While at home, her mother would help her catch up with her studies, and then give her crayons, paper, needle, thread and fabric to make art. Her family encouraged her creativity by taking her to concerts, museums and shows. A teacher once asked her to draw a mountain. Having grown up in the city, she had never seen a mountain and could not draw one properly. The teacher told her she could not become an artist, but Ringgold said she would and she did. This underlying theme that it is always possible to attain one’s dreams is woven throughout her work. After completing high school in 1948, Ringgold went on to City College in New York. She graduated in 1955 with a B.S. in Art and then taught in the New York Public Schools for 18 years.

Faith Ringgold


In the 1980s Ringgold developed the story quilt painting. She began using this format after working on a major quilt-making project with her mother and other quilt makers in celebration of women’s art. This is when Ringgold began to receive national recognition. Her first story quilt, Who’s Afraid of Aunt Jemima? (1983), tells the family history of Jemima Blakey, a successful restaurant owner. The fictional Jemima was both a tribute to Ringgold’s mother (also a successful businesswoman) and a fresh take on the Aunt Jemima stereotype. Ringgold believed that the image had positive aspects that had been overlooked because of its well-known negative connotations. In 1985, Ringgold became a full professor at the University of San Diego. She also has art studios in New York. In 1990, Ringgold completed her first children’s book entitled Tar Beach based on memories of her childhood in Harlem. She continues to write and illustrate children’s books. Summary of Their Artistic Persona Ringgold stated she became an artist for the same reason she became a writer – to tell her story. Ringgold remembers sitting for hours while listening to her mother and other relatives tell stories about the struggles and triumphs of various people. The stories in her artwork are just about life and all the things that happen to people. A characteristic of many of Ringgold’s stories is that they are presented as a close-up of one scene in an ongoing tale. This tale is told without firm conclusion or moral. This approach is derived from an African tradition of story telling called a dilemma tale, an ongoing saga about the everyday lives of people told without judgment. The African American traditions of Ringgold’s family are strongly reflected in her work. The women in Ringgold’s family have a long tradition of quilt making. Ringgold’s mother learned the quilt making techniques of her great grandmother, a former slave. One of Ringgold’s earliest memories is of the quilt her mother used to keep her warm in her stroller. As a mature artist, Ringgold returned to her family’s quilt making tradition, expanding and enhancing the media to produce the story quilt, which has become her most important cultural contribution. Ringgold incorporates repeated patterns, lush colors, and highly stylized human figures in her work. Her figures are often presented in full frontal pose that resembles Ethiopian and Egyptian sculptures. She has also drawn from the tradition in Chinese painting where text is included in the painting itself. While Chinese text is brief and purely descriptive, Ringgold has expanded on this, creating a narrative, which could stand on its own. When asked how she writes the stories of her quilts, Ringgold responded she thinks about the characters and the story she wants to tell. Then she begins to write the chapters in segments. Then, just like the materials of a quilt, she pieces the words together until they make a story. To date, Ringgold has “written” 30 story quilts. Through her work she gives her viewers a sense of the complexities and issues facing an African American feminist artist in the contemporary American art world. Her underlying strength, her respect for humanity, and her belief that we can change for the better override the sadness of some of her stories and leave her viewers with a sense of hope for the future.

Faith Ringgold


Featured Artwork Church Picnic 19881, acrylic on canvas, tie-dyed, pieced fabric border

In Ringgold’s story quilt, Church Picnic, we see a slice of African American life presented with imagery and with corresponding script. Following the tradition prevailing in American art schools where art students are encouraged to draw from their own experience, Ringgold tells us about her world. However, in her presentation she uses the format of a dilemma tale which she has heard used many times by her relatives in their story telling sessions. The minister and a young woman in the middle of the picture obviously like each other and are the center of attention as members of the congregation look on in approval or amusement. The story teller is the older woman seated in the upper right corner with her young son at her side. After arriving home, she recounts the events of the afternoon to her

daughter who never showed up at the picnic and who the story teller thinks is listening in the next room. As the story teller continues to recount the story of the picnic and budding romance, the mother realizes that her daughter, to whom she thinks she is talking, is not even home. In fact, the daughter had not gone to the picnic because she too is in love with the minister and could not bear to face seeing him in love with someone else. We are left to wonder how the mother will deal with her daughter’s situation when she comes home. We are also left with the feeling of how common these tales of unresolved affairs of the heart are. Though the setting and characters are perhaps different from the viewer’s experience, the tale of passion and of lost love is a common experience for many people. Ask

• What do you think about this painting? (probe for emotional reactions to see if they like it or not)

• How does the painting make you feel? (happy? sad?) • What is the focal point of the painting? (the couple standing in the middle) • Does everyone see the small panels of words in this quilt? What story is this quilt trying to tell?

Faith Ringgold


• Do you think the people are having a good time? Why or why not (yes – everyone is smiling) • Where do you think the people were before the picnic? Where do you think they are going

next? • The story teller is the woman sitting in the upper right with her young son at her side. Do you

think the story might be different if the minister told the story? Or if the other woman who is in love with the minister told the story? (yes – different points of view)

• Ringgold is known for her sense of hope. When looking at Church Picnic, what do you think various people are hopeful for, for example, the minister, the woman telling the story, the story teller’s daughter?

The Sunflowers Quilting Bee at Arles 1991, acrylic on canvas, tie-dyed, pieced fabric border

Sunflower Quilting Bee tells a story. A group of famous 19th and 20th century African-American women are holding a quilting bee. Here in Arles, France, they meet the Dutch painter Vincent van Gogh, who made paintings of sunflowers. The heroines pictured are: Madame C. J. Walker, Sojourner Truth, Ida B. Wells, Fannie Lou Hamer, Harriet Tubman, Rosa Parks, Mary McLeod Bethune and Ella Baker. Sometimes an artist pays tribute to other artists by incorporating them into artworks. Faith Ringgold has chosen to honor Vincent Van Gogh in a colorful quilt.

Ask:

• What do you think is the most interesting thing about this quilt? • Does anyone know who Vincent Van Gogh is? (Famous post-impressionist artist who died long

before Faith was born.) • Why do you think Faith included Van Gogh in this painting? • What do you think he is doing over there? • What do you think of the colors she uses? (Yellow was a favorite of Van Gogh. Is that why she

used a lot of it? • Is this quilt realistic to you? Why or why not

Faith Ringgold


Discussing the Art Further Other Quilts from Ringgold’s Series: The French Collection The series tells the fictional story of Willa Marie Simone, a young black woman who moves to Paris in the early 20th century. Told through text written around the margin of each quilt, Willa Marie’s adventures lead her to meet celebrities such as Pablo Picasso and Henri Matisse, Josephine Baker, Zora Neale Hurston, Sojourner Truth, and Rosa Parks on the road to becoming an artist and businesswoman. Drawing on her own struggle for recognition in an art world dominated by European traditions and male artists, Ringgold uses this narrative format to literally rewrite the past by weaving together histories of modern art, African-American culture, and personal biography. This practice reflects the shift toward postmodernism in art of the 1980s and 1990s. In deliberate contrast to Modernism’s emphasis on autonomy and universal meaning, artists like Ringgold highlighted the implicit biases in accepted forms of art, especially in their treatment of race and gender. Characteristic is her use of appropriation, narrative, biographical references, and non-Western traditions. Through these devices, Ringgold offers an alternative to the European and masculine perspectives that are prevalent in art history. Dancing at the Louvre 1991, acrylic on canvas, tie-dyed, pieced fabric border

Faith Ringgold’s Dancing at the Louvre is all about breaking the rules, and having lots of fun while doing it. Combining representational painting and African-American quilting techniques with the written word, Dancing at the Louvre is the first in Ringgold’s series of twelve “story quilts” called The French Collection. The series tells the fictional story of Willa Marie Simone, a young black woman who moves to Paris in the early 20th century. Told through text written around the margin of each quilt, Willa Marie’s adventures lead her to meet celebrities such as Pablo Picasso and Henri Matisse, Josephine Baker, Zora Neale Hurston, Sojourner Truth, and Rosa Parks on the road to becoming an artist and businesswoman.

Faith Ringgold


Matisse’s Chapel (The French Collection) 1991, acrylic on canvas, tie-dyed, pieced fabric border Ringgold visited a chapel in France designed by Henri Matisse, a well-known French artist. Matisse’s Chapel became a story quilt based on an imaginary gathering of Faith’s own relatives in the chapel. In the story quilt they are known as Willia’s family.

COLOR

• What colors did Ringgold use in her paintings? (green, black, red, blue) • Are the colors warm or cool? (warm, rich colors) • Name as many different greens as you can (emerald green, Kelly green, lime green, etc.) • How does the use of these colors make you feel (happy? relaxed?)

LIGHT

• Is the picture light or dark? (dark) • Where does the light appear to be coming from? (behind the trees)

SHAPE

• Do you see more geometric or free-form shapes? (geometric) • What shapes do you see? (circles-plates/heads, triangles-skirts/quilt, rectangles-picnic blankets)

LINE

• Where do you see straight lines? (quilt edges, picnic blanket edges) • Where do you see curved, soft lines? (hats, bows on dresses)

TEXTURE

• What types of textures do you see in the painting? (soft/smooth – picnic blankets, clothing, rough – tree branches)

• What effect does the fabric border, the quilt, have on the painting? (it softens it, adds more texture, makes you want to touch it)

Faith Ringgold


SPACE

• What takes up the most space – the people or the background? (people) Resources https://www.khanacademy.org/humanities/global-culture/identity-body/identity-body-united-states/a/ringgold-dancing-at-the-louvre https://www.questia.com/magazine/1P3-38629032/new-york-artist-takes-us-dancing-at-the-louvre http://www.nytimes.com/1998/10/02/arts/art-review-colorful-patchwork-tales-of-black-and-white-life-and-death.html?pagewanted=all http://www.knowitall.org/artopia/sculpture/artcritic/text/text.cfm?artWorkID=35 To see the Church Picnic story quilt online, go to www.faithringgold.com/ringgold/d05.htm Faith Ringgold: A Study Guide for Teachers, Elizabeth Ament, PHD, Shorewood Fine Art Reproductions, 1996 Faith Ringgold’s French Collection and Other Story Quilt: Dancing at the Louvre, Dan Cameron, University of California Press, 1998 www.faithringgold.com Faith Ringgold’s Biography, www.teacher.scholastic.com/authorsandbooks/events/ringgold

faith ringgold - art in the classroom february...

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