One from the supplementary suite of an illustrated book with ten woodcuts and a supplementary suite of seven woodcuts
Not on view
Puryear collaborated on a reedition of Jean Toomer’s Cane (1923), a classic of African American literature from the Harlem Renaissance. Toomer's experimental novel consists of a series of vignettes, set across the northern and southern United States, in which Black protagonists encounter violence, racism, spirituality, and desire. Echoing Cane’s keen attention to racial identity, Puryear’s slipcase is crafted of woods native to Africa, Europe, and North America that evoke a range of skin colors. His accompanying abstract woodcuts are named after the female characters in the novel. “The challenge,” Puryear said, “was to create a set of images that would relate together in a familial way, suggestive of the narrative but not overtly so.”
2020
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