Saturday Haiku in celebration of light

This week on my blog I have been remembering 400 years of Africans and Europeans building a nation together. It is not our finest heritage, that a new nation used slave labor and displaced indigenous people to build what has come to be known as the highest example of freedom, liberty, and democracy. Yet it is the paradox that we must embrace and live with if we are to forge ahead to a better society.

Today's haiku is one I wrote two years ago, inspired by the art of Henry Ossawa Tanner, the first African American artist to achieve international acclaim. Because of the racial climate in the U.S., Tanner would have to move to France in order to find international appreciation, much like the writer James Baldwin would do a generation later.

lantern light

in autumn darkness

peaceful time 
                        ~ CK

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Image: "Etaples Fisher Folk" (1923) at the High Museum of Art

Artist: Henry Ossawa Tanner

Medium: Tempera and oil on canvas

(Public Domain, courtesy of Wikipedia Commons)

About the Artist:

Henry Ossawa Tanner (June 21, 1859 – May 25, 1937) was an American artist and the first African-American painter to gain international acclaim. Tanner moved to Paris, France, in 1891 to study, and continued to live there after being accepted in French artistic circles. His painting entitled Daniel in the Lions' Den was accepted into the 1896 Salon, the official art exhibition of the Académie des Beaux-Arts in Paris.

After his own self-study in art as a young man, Tanner enrolled in 1879 at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts in Philadelphia. The only black student, he became a favorite of the painter Thomas Eakins, who had recently begun teaching there. Tanner made other connections among artists, including Robert Henri. In the late 1890s he was sponsored for a trip to then-Palestine by Rodman Wanamaker, who was impressed by his paintings of biblical themes. (Wikipedia)

About the Image:

In "Etaples Fisher Folk", Tanner’s use of chiaroscuro (dark-light contrast) suggests the influence of seventeenth-century Dutch painters, particularly Rembrandt, and sets a solemn, religious tone for this scene of two peasants preparing a meal. Using an unusual technique, Tanner combined tempera and oils and applied them in heavy layers. (Google Arts and Culture) 

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America's Roots: The Imperfect Thomas Jefferson

The following video, just under ten minutes long, was aired on CBS Sunday Morning in a segment titled, "The Duality of Thomas Jefferson." It examines Jefferson the progressive thinker and writer of the Declaration of Independence juxtaposed to Jefferson the plantation owner and slaveholder.  You can view it at their YourTube site at https://youtu.be/bzZnqXvRSLE.

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Our American Roots: Embracing the Paradox

Captain John Smith's 1612 map of the Colony of Virginia offered the first detailed map of the Chesapeake Region 

Dr. Barry Whittemore, Professor of History, Anthropology, and Philosophy at the University of North Georgia and Unitarian Universalist minister made the following statement which succinctly captures the essence of our American roots:

“400 years ago today two English privateers traded a captured cargo (20-30) of Africans for provisions in the colony of Virginia, launching us down the road to slavery. Less than three weeks earlier the House of Burgesses met for the first time in Jamestown, launching us up the road toward representative democracy.

“We are a people of paradox. What is good in our nation and what is evil in our nation are 400 years old. We tend to extoll the virtues of one and sweep the other under the rug. Both must be held to the light and dealt with before we can be whole. Never speak of one without remembering the other. Embrace the paradox.”

The privateer ships in question were the White Lion and the Treasurer. They delivered the first Africans to these American shores and thus began our foundational move toward slavery. It took a tragic war to free ourselves from the bondage of such beginnings, and we are still emerging from that history.

A Time for Healing

Today, bells will be ringing to commemorate a National Day of Healing as we mark the 400th anniversary of the arrival of the first slaves to the American colonies. A statement issued by the National Parks Service offers hope for healing and reconciliation:

August 25, 2019 is the 400th anniversary of the first landing of enslaved Africans in English-occupied North America at Point Comfort in Hampton, Virginia, now part of Fort Monroe National Monument, a unit of the National Park System. 

The anniversary will be commemorated at Fort Monroe as a day of healing and reconciliation. The park and its partners are inviting all 419 national parks, NPS programs, community partners, and the public to come together in solidarity to ring bells simultaneously across the nation for four minutes—one for each century—to honor the first Africans who landed in 1619 at Point Comfort and 400 years of African American history.

Detail from John Smith's map of Virginia showing Point Comfort

Each day this week, Not Dark Yet will feature some shared insights in marking 400 years of African American history.



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