WASHINGTON, DC.- The Smithsonian’s National Portrait Gallery is presenting “Black Out: Silhouettes Then and Now,” as the first major museum exhibition to explore the art form of cut-paper profiles in terms of their rich historical roots and powerful contemporary presence. Well before the advent of photography in 1839, silhouettes democratized portraiture. Offering virtually instantaneous likenesses of everyone from presidents to those who were enslaved, silhouettes cost far less than oil paintings and could be made with inexpensive materials. Museums have paid little attention to the art form, but “Black Out” aims to broaden the traditional American art canon by placing silhouettes—and their subjects—at the forefront.
The exhibition, which primarily features works on paper, also brings together sculptures, prints, media art and mixed-media installations. Ranging in scale from 3 inches to nearly 40 feet, and featuring art from 1796 to today, the exhibition presents around 50 unique objects. “Black Out: Silhouettes Then and Now” is curated by Asma Naeem, the Portrait Gallery’s curator of prints, drawings and media arts, and will be on view through March 10, 2019.
The “Then” portion of the exhibition focuses on those who have been previously “blacked out” in historical narratives by presenting silhouettes of same-sex couples, cooks, activist women, enslaved individuals and disability pioneers. Also on view are some of the earliest examples of American portraiture by artisans who were otherwise powerless, including those who had been enslaved, such as Moses Williams, or those who were physically challenged, such as Martha Ann Honeywell who cut silhouettes using her mouth. The “Now” portion of “Black Out” explores how today silhouettes are no less ubiquitous and can be seen on everything from book illustrations and commercial advertising to the profiles people create on smartphones. Organized into four large, gallery-sized installations, artwork by leading contemporary women artists take the silhouette form to new heights.
“With both historical and contemporary explorations into the form of silhouette, ‘Black Out’ reveals new pathways between past and present, particularly with regard to how we can reassess notions of race, power, individualism and, even, the digital self,” Naeem said. “‘Black Out’ unpacks the art of silhouettes as a potent art form, revealing the paradoxes of a country roiling with ideals of freedom and the trauma of slavery in the 1800s and the messiness of our modern lives.”
“THEN”
The historical section of the exhibition displays works by Auguste Edouart and William Bache, two of the most well-known silhouette artists of their time. Edouart hand cut more than 3,800 silhouette portraits in America, only seven of which are known to be of enslaved persons. “Black Out” presents two of these portraits—the first showing of these works by a major institution. The exhibition also presents Edouart’s portrait of John Quincy Adams from the Portrait Gallery’s extensive holdings of Edouart’s silhouettes. “Black Out” features a rare gem, a life-size profile of a 19-year-old enslaved woman named Flora, whose silhouette was discovered with an original bill of sale from 1796, wherein she was sold for 25 pounds sterling. This work is one of the few known portraits of an enslaved person from the 18th century in institutional hands in the U.S. The Portrait Gallery has recently conserved this extraordinary portrait.
In its more liberalizing form, “Black Out” showcases the boundary-breaking history of silhouettes, including a creamware jug featuring a portrait of the first African American Episcopal priest, Absalom Jones; the earliest-known likeness of a same-sex couple, a double silhouette of Sylvia Drake and Charity Bryant from c. 1805–15; and a silhouette album by Bache from the first decade of the 19th century. Visitors have the opportunity to scroll through digital pages of the Bache album to see such subjects as George and Martha Washington, along with many everyday New Orleans citizens.
“NOW”
Showcasing the relevance of silhouettes today, “Black Out” includes large installations by four contemporary women artists who explore issues of slavery, gender, modern alienation and people’s relationship with technology. Renowned artist Kara Walker is exhibiting two of her panoramic wall murals of often graphic and nightmarish scenes of plantation life, along with an equally disturbing metal miniaturized playset. MacArthur “Genius” Fellow and Stanford University professor Camille Utterback uses coding and computer software to create an interactive digital work that reacts to visitors’ shadows and movements, all in an effort to reemphasize people’s physicality in this virtual age. Also on view is an 18-foot-tall installation by Canadian artist Kristi Malakoff featuring lifesize cut-outs of children dancing playfully around a Maypole, a seemingly three-dimensional appropriation of silhouettes. The fourth gallery features work by New York-based artist Kumi Yamashita (a finalist of the Portrait Gallery’s 2013 Outwin Boochever Portrait Competition), who “sculpts” light and shadow with objects to create mixed-media profiles of people who are not there. In “Origami,” Yamashita creases the edges of origami squares so precisely as to create each sitter’s distinct profile in shadow.
