Survivor

Source catalog description

This description refers to material held by Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture. Visual details below describe the original material.

A framed black and white linocut print titled “Survivor” by Elizabeth Catlett. The print references Dorothea Lange’s photograph “Ex-Slave with a Long Memory, Alabama,” taken in 1937. Catlett’s print mirrors Lange’s photograph. The print captures a formerly enslaved elderly woman standing in the center of a field holding a thin walking stick with both hands. She is looking off to the right. She is wearing an apron, a hoop earring in her right ear, and a head scarf wrapped over her forehead and tied at the nape of her neck, covering her hair. The background consists of black and white patterns resembling a field. The print is signed by the artist on the front in the lower right corner in pencil [E. Catlett] and the title is written in the lower left in pencil [Survivor A/P].

Explore Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture ↗