Over the last few years, a new trend has become more prominent in the canon. The term “black face” is not a new term but has been recently attributed to the artworks of art that is now being produced in African Art. Artists are painting artworks with simple portraiture but the pigment of black is pronounced. The focus being on the blackness of said portraiture.
In this essay I would argue why it is problematic to attribute the term “black face” to what is simply a way that subjects or muses with black skin being brought to the forefront in the Art Sphere on a more global spotlight is ultimately a way to diminish the indomitable celebration of Black subjects in art that has come to play in Art History.
Blackface has its origins in 19th century American minstrel shows where white comedians would paint their faces black with red lips in order to show racial stereotypes in American Culture. This is especially significant in the context of segregation in America and the insipid racism that existed in the Jim Crow laws of the time that meant that Blackface was a direct affront on Blackness.
Fast forward from the 19th Century to a quarter of a century into the twenty-first and artists from, Africa are coming into the spotlight and entering the canon in a way that is different than before. There is an interconnectedness between the way that African artists are exhibiting their works on a global stage. Rather than a Western perspective of art and appropriation as was prevalent in the 18th Century such as Picasso referencing African Masks in his “Demoiselle D’Avignon” or Gauguin retreating to the African city of Tahiti to get away from the traditional and White centric canon, Africa is being represented by Africans themselves and now more than ever, we seeactual subjects of black people, painted by black people. This is pivotal because for some time, if there was a portrait of a black person it was painted in relation to their inferiority and through the gaze and in perspective of a white person.
Now that Africans are starting to enter the conversation around Art History, and for more black subjects to be at the crux of the Art World, these steps forward and reversed tenfold whenever artworks with black subjects are painted they are referred to as “Black face”. This term holds all of the racist connotation of the minstrel comedies that satirizes the racial imbalances between black and white in racist America. I want to argue that the fact that Black faces are being highlighted is because more black people are painting and if a portrait is being focused on African culture then the muses and the subjects being black in unavoidable and the black faces in paintings are not just a trend or a fad but the insertion of a more diverse subject base and canon.
However, the fact is that some African artists have picked up on the trend of black portraiture coming to the forefront and have been portraying the pigmentation of blackness as darker than is natural for an African and this is where the likening to Blackface of minstrel comedies makes sense. When white actors performed Blackface, they would use charcoal that is pitch black. This is where the disparity comes into play because Africans are not actually black in any way but carry hues that are more brown than black. The term “black” is a construct to diminish Africans and lumps all Africans together in an aftermath of colonialism.
In conclusion, I would argue that there is a subtle diminishing of the insert of African Art into the canon, however the blatant overshadowing of the black subject in recent art by Africans and darkening the pigment of black subjects in art is a direct link to the minstrels of the 19th century. And this focusing on black skin is problematic for African Art. The introduction and spotlight of black skin is something that is inevitable and a simple follow on from the fact that African culture is being portrayed and introduced to the canon but the pronouncing and emphasising of blackness in portraiture of people of African decent is where the issue lies and brings with it racist connotations.
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