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Kerry James Marshall , b. October 17, 1955

Souvenir II

1997
108 in. x 120 in. (274.32 cm x 304.8 cm)

Medium and Support: Acrylic, collage, and glitter on unstretched canvas banner

Credit Line: Purchased as the gift of the Addison Advisory Council in honor of John ("Jock") M. Reynolds's directorship of the Addison Gallery of American Art, 1989-1998

Accession Number: 1998.160

Commentary

Gallery label for Walls and Beams, Rooms and Dreams: Images of Home, January 23 - July 31, 2016

While Kerry James Marshall developed a radically different visual vocabulary for his 1997-98 series, Souvenir, he also maintained some of his trademark techniques, such as impulsive accent brushstrokes and methodical layering of forms inspired by the aesthetics of illustration. Set in the living room of the artist’s great-aunt’s sister and her husband, Bertha Mae and Clifford Clark, this scene prominently features the element that unifies the entire series: the group of three portraits of President John F. Kennedy, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., and Senator Robert F. Kennedy. Almost hagiographic in their function, the commemorative portraits of “The Holy Trinity of the Civil Rights Movement” would have been typically encountered in the homes of most working-class African-American homes of the late 1960s and early 1970s. Inserted into the realistic framework of this domestic environment are the angelically winged heads of lesser-known figures of the civil-rights and black-liberation struggle, which hover above the head of the stately homemaker as she surveys the prized possessions of her domain.

Kelley Tialiou
Charles H. Sawyer Curatorial Assistant | Librarian | Archivist

Exhibition List

This object was included in the following exhibitions:

Mementos [Kerry James Marshall : Mementos] The Renaissance Society at The University of Chicago , 5/6/1998 - 7/30/2000
New Work: Recent Additions to the Collection Addison Gallery of American Art , 4/21/2001 - 7/31/2001
Family Ties: A Contemporary Perspective Peabody Essex Museum , 6/6/2003 - 9/9/2003
Art, Artists, and the Addison: Building a Collection Addison Gallery of American Art , 3/30/2004 - 7/31/2004
Kerry James Marshall, Along the Way Camden Arts Centre , 11/25/2005 - 7/2/2006
Kerry James Marshall, Along the Way Modern Art, Oxford , 7/22/2006 - 10/22/2006
80 @ 80 Addison Gallery of American Art , 10/15/2011 - 12/31/2011
Walls and Beams, Rooms and Dreams: Images of Home Addison Gallery of American Art , 1/23/2016 - 7/31/2016
Figuring History: Robert Colescott, Kerry James Marshall, Mickalene Thomas Seattle Art Museum , 2/15/2018 - 5/13/2018
Reciprocal Loan Detroit Institute of Arts , 1/7/2019 - 8/31/2019
To Make Visible: Art and Activism, 1980–2000 Addison Gallery of American Art , 10/16/2020 - 1/3/2021
Grief and Grievance: Art and Mourning in America New Museum of Contemporary Art , 2/16/2021 - 6/6/2021
Past Is Prologue: History in Contemporary Art Addison Gallery of American Art , 4/16/2022 - 7/31/2022
Kerry James Marshall Royal Academy of Arts , 9/20/2025 - 1/24/2027

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