The Harlem Rennaisance is one of the most brilliant and significant eras in African American history.

African American arts flourished in this era with record numbers of paintings, sculptures, and literary works. In addition, African American performing arts also boomed in this era with lots of unique artists redefining music, drama, and dance. This period of artistic ingenuity and creativity began in Harlem during the late 1910s. After the Industrial Revolution, we see the rise and movement of Americans from the rural areas to the many Industrial cities; cities now became the centerpiece for defining and outlining the cultural symbols of a particular community. As many African Americans migrated in huge numbers from the south to the north during that time, they began to centralize and establish strong communities in Harlem. Harlem now became the center place for African American culture with great artists such as Langston Hughes, Aaron Douglas, Lois Mailou Jones olutionized literature and art as whole with their unique commentary on societal and class struggles that plagued our nation at that time. Another key element of the Harlem Renaissance is the growth of the stylish middle class African Americans that comprised of the art center of the Renaissance. As the African American culture in Harlem flourished and many african american artists and their work grew in popularity; there emerged a core of successful middle class African American who formed the core of this renaissance. Their taste in art was very sophisticated from the music of Duke Ellington and Bessie Smith, to the paintings of Aaron Douglas and the poetry of Langson Hughes. These elites unlike the patrons of the Italian Renaissance before them would sponsor lavish exhibits to promote African American culture (Pohl) According to Pohl, this period is especially significant because it called for for equality through the arts, not through direct political action (Pohl). Their arts sort of unveiled the mask and exposed the exclusion of African Americans from the various areas of American society, and above all that, it sort to give a concrete identity to the African American cultural experience. One of my favorite paintings from the Harlem Renaissance is the Jockey Club by Archibald Motley Jr. This painting shows several white patrons as they begin to enter the club contrasted sharply to the black figure of the doorman, whose face appears to express a certain apprehension (Pohl). The clear tension in the doorman's features shows the underlying social tension that many African Americans were facing in those times. Motley Jr's loose brush strokes depicted a carefree group of white party-goers whilst also showing the uncomfortable look on the African American doorman's face. Motley Jr's work is as much a social commentary on racial inequality as it a commentary of the class struggles brought about by the urbanization of American cities.

Another famous Harlem Renaissance painting that I really enjoyed was Palmer Hayden's Mid Summer Night in Harlem (Pohl 354). This work is a clever satire of Shakespeare's A Mid

Pohl, Frances K. Framing America: A Social History of American Art. New York, NY: Thames & Hudson, 2002. This bright water color master piece