Photography: Carl Van Vechten's Magic Act
Written: Feb 21 '05 (Updated Feb 21 '05)
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Product Rating:
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Pros: A stunning cellebration of African American Achievement
Cons: The blurbs that accompany the photos were complete but dry as dust
The Bottom Line: It's a joy to look at.
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| ed_grover's Full Review: Generations In Black & White From The Books |
For Black History Month, 2005, I'd like to continue my fascination with Carl Van Vechten's photographs of prominent members of the African American arts and culture during three decades starting in the 1930s. I get Generations in Black & White: Photographs by Carl Van Vechten from the James Weldon Johnson Memorial Collection from the library every year or so to look at the photos and refresh some memories.
This coffee table book, with a portrait of Billie Holliday on the cover, was edited by Rudolph P. Byrd an associate professor of African American literature at Emory University. The eighty-three photographs of prominent African Americans in this oversized book (8 1/2" by 11") were taken by invitation only and presented as gifts to the subjects. Indeed, The only photograph of a white person is a self-portrait taken by Van Vechten that appears in Byrd's informative and well-written introduction. Van Vechten did not limit himself to African American subjects. Two of my white friends and mentors (a writer and an artist) had photographs taken by Van Vechten when they were younger and on the scene in New York City.
Byrd devotes more than a page in explanation and defense of Van Vechten's controversial novel, N*gger Heaven, and quotes James Weldon Johnson's argument that Carl's portrayal of primitive life in Harlem was more balanced than that of Claude McKay's "Home To Harlem." He called it a fine novel and felt that critics such as W.E.B. Du Bois and Sterling A. Brown had been stopped cold by the title and never read the book. If it hadn't been for the furor caused by this infamous novel Carl Van Vechten might have become more famous for his photographs rather than his somewhat obscure writings such as The Tattooed Countess.
Van Vechten (1880 - 1964) was interested in African American culture since his childhood in Cedar Rapids, Iowa. As a boy he was given a box camera and soon graduated to more sophisticated Kodak cameras. When he was in Chicago working as a reporter, he was taught how to use a Lieca and his boyhood hobby became a passion that replaced his pursuit of writing. Van Vechten met many of the prominent figures associated with the Harlem Renaissance known in black culture as the New Negro Movement by many blacks because that term does not limit itself strictly to the goings on in Harlem.
In 1933 Van Vechten began his important work in documenting the faces of individual writers, artists and other literati of the Harlem Renaissance. Most of the photos were taken over a period of 30 years in a room set aside as a studio in Van Vechten's West Fifty-fifth Street apartment in Manhattan. About his photographs, Van Vechten says, "I am certain that my first interest in making [these] photographs was documentary and probably my latest interest in making them is documentary too . . . I wanted to show young people of all races how many distinguished Negroes there were in this world . . . he adds that the process of making photographic portraits is a magical act."
The Photographs:
Rudolph Byrd presents Van Vechten's photographs in the order in which the subjects became prominent, not in the order that the photographer took them. The majority of the portraits are of people in the arts where his personal interests lay. Not all fields of study are covered, but he did manage to photograph two boxers, Henry Armstrong and Joe Lewis and a politician . . . namely Ralph J. Bunche.
The first photograph in the book is of W.E.B Du Bois, Sociologist, Historian, Novelist, Educator, Poet and Historian. The photo is dated July 18, 1946 and shows Du Bois against a background of African batik fabric. He is slightly bent but presents a friendly mien. The next photo is of Mary McLeod Bethune, an Educator and Humanitarian who was the daughter of slaves. The photo is dated April 6, 1949. Bethune started a school for young African American women in Daytona Beach, Florida in 1904. Bethune is shown in and upholstered French chair with her cane by her side. The background is unmemorable except for a bit of checkered cloth at one side.
Page 10 finds us at a portrait of James Weldon Johnson: Educator, Lawyer, Composer, Diplomat, Novelist, Poet, and humanitarian. Photo dated December 3, 1932. Johnson was killed in an automobile crash in 1938, and the memorial collection in his name was organized and finally completed at Yale University in 1945. Van Vechten donated his considerable personal library (including his photographs of African Americans), to Yale University after Johnson's death in 1938 to perpetuate Johnson's contributions to Negro arts, literature, civil rights, education and public service.
Johnson joined the NAACP in 1912 as field secretary and served as secretary of the NAACP in 1920 for 10 years. Among his other accomplishments was an experimental novel, The Autobiography of an Ex-Colored Man, a reviewed by Stephen_Murray. He also collaborated with his brother, John Rosamond Johnson, a musician and composer, on a song called "Lift Every Voice and Sing," often called the Negro national anthem. The photograph is only one of a few with a full frontal pose. It is very formal with Johnson in a dark suit against a dark background. His face is lighted from the right and we behold a highly intelligent and benevolent man.
The following photograph with a very short biography is of Johnson's brother, John, a musician and composer. The photo was taken April 22, 1932 and shows the subject against a background of floral chintz (or is it wallpaper?). On we go to William Christopher Handy (the father of the blues), Bill "Bojangles" Robinson, famous for more than that movie tap dance with Shirley Temple, and scores of other creative people like Rose McClendon (1935 – an actress and Director), Roland Hayes (1954 – an opera singer and educator) and Horace Pippin (1940 - a self-taught painter). Pippin is one of the few subjects photographed out of doors. He is posed in profile against the shaggy bark of an old tree.
The moods of the photographs are created by Van Vechten's lighting and his creative use of background materials and props. On page 38 there is a striking photograph of Nella Larsen (1934 – novelist, librarian and nurse). Ms. Larsen was children's librarian at the 135th Strteet branch of the New York Public Library. She wrote two novels and was the first African American woman to receive a Guggenheim Fellowship in creative writing. She never wrote another novel, but instead returned to her training as a nurse at Bethel Hospital for the remainder of her life. This striking portrait is taken against an abstract background with Larsen holding a spray of crepe paper magnolias.
Further on we find a portrait of Blues singer, Bessie Smith taken against a pale floral background that reminded me of a bedspread. She is an evening gown and is holding a large fan of turkey feathers. Next up is Ada "Bricktop" Smith (1934 – Jazz singer and nightclub owner). A young, gap-toothed Ethel Waters (1938 – singer and actress) is shown in a paper souvenir hat with a daisy sticking straight upo. She is shown against a circular motif background.
Not all the singers were women, Paul Robeson (1933 – is listed as an actor, and athlete, a singer and a humanitarian). Here the background is a drapery of cellophane at the left side of the picture. The cellophane is used as a full background for a portrait of Katherine Dunham (1940 – dancer, choreographer, anthropologist and educator) and reminded me of some of the backgrounds used by Cecil Beaton in his photographs.
The gay black element is well represented and aside from Bobby Short (1962 – Jazz singer and musician), Langston Hughes (1942 – poet, fiction writer and dramatist), Hughes/Van Vechten Letters and James Baldwin (1955 – novelist and dramatist), the only other out gay black man I found was Billy "Swee' Pea" Strayhorn, Duke Ellington's fabulous arranger and lyricist who wrote such famous songs as Lush Life and Take The A-Train. Identifying any others would take more knowledge than I possess or a very strong gaydar.
This is a wonderful book to browse through and I hope it inspires some readers to read about and do more research more about some of the creative African Americans that are pictured between the covers.(The University of Georgia Press, ISBN: 0-8203-1558-3, alkaline paper).
Ed Grover – February 2005
Recommended:
Yes
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