One of America's most complex and prolific
artists, Kara Walker creates haunting roomsized
tableaux whose emotive power lies in
the dichotomy between her medium – the
genteel 18th-century art of cut-paper silhouettes
– and the rawness of the scenes depicted.
In her dynamic, sinuous black figures and
parodic drawings of negresses and plantation
owners she subverts American history as it's
been taught and engages with the legacy of
slavery in the contemporary consciousness.
Language too, in the form the satirical titles to
her works, is used to brilliant effect.
Walker Art Center, one of the first to spot Kara
Walker's talent, now hosts a retrospective: her
work is arranged as a narrative that explores a
path through the history of slavery, romantic
fiction and Hollywood film to present-day
notions of primitivism. The exhibition travels
to New York and Los Angeles.

Walker Art Center
Kara Walker
1750 Hennepin Avenue, Minneapolis, MN.
T. +1 612 375 7600