Harlem Renaissance Art

Flashcards of key vocabulary and figures from lecture notes on African American art during the Harlem Renaissance.

The Great Migration

A mass movement of over six million African Americans from the rural South to urban centers in the North and West, occurring in waves between World War I and the 1970s.

Red Summer (1919)

A period of intense racial violence in the summer and fall of 1919, during which white mobs attacked Black communities in over 25 U.S. cities.

The New Negro

A concept developed by Alain Locke in his anthology The New Negro (1925), which referred to a reimagined Black identity marked by pride, intellect, and cultural independence.

Pan-Africanism

A global movement advocating for the solidarity of all people of African descent, emphasizing shared heritage, anti-colonial resistance, and collective progress.

Patronage

Financial and logistical support given to artists through organizations, individuals, or the government, allowing them to produce and exhibit work.

The Great Depression

A worldwide economic crisis that began with the 1929 stock market crash and led to massive unemployment, poverty, and social upheaval.

The New Deal

A series of programs introduced by President Franklin D. Roosevelt to combat the effects of the Great Depression. Included the WPA Federal Art Project, which supported artists with public commissions.

NAACP

Founded in 1909, the NAACP is the oldest civil rights organization in the U.S., dedicated to political, educational, and social equality for African Americans.

UNIA

Founded in 1914 by Marcus Garvey, the UNIA was a mass Black nationalist organization promoting economic independence and global Pan-African unity.

National Urban League

Founded in 1910, the League focused on the economic and social advancement of African Americans, especially in urban centers.

The Harmon Foundation

A white-led philanthropic organization founded in 1922 to promote the work of Black professionals, particularly artists and educators.

The Barnes Foundation

An educational art institution founded in 1922 by Dr. Albert C. Barnes in Pennsylvania, known for its influential collection and emphasis on formal analysis.

Harlem Artists Guild

Formed in 1935 by artists including Charles Alston, Augusta Savage, and Norman Lewis, the Guild was a collective advocating for racial equity in the arts.

Works Progress Administration (WPA)

A New Deal federal program (1935–1943) providing employment for millions of Americans during the Great Depression, including artists, through the Federal Art Project.

The Crisis

The official magazine of the NAACP, founded in 1910 and edited for decades by W.E.B. Du Bois.

Opportunity

A journal published by the National Urban League that focused on social science but also included art, literature, and cultural commentary.

Fire!!

A radical arts journal launched in 1926 by a younger generation of Harlem Renaissance artists, including Langston Hughes, Zora Neale Hurston, and Aaron Douglas.

Alain Locke

Philosopher, educator, and editor; often referred to as the “Father of the Harlem Renaissance.”

W.E.B. Du Bois

Sociologist, historian, and co-founder of the NAACP.

James Weldon Johnson

Writer, diplomat, and civil rights activist.

Harlem Hellfighters

A predominantly Black U.S. Army unit in World War I, originally part of the New York National Guard.

James A. Porter

Art historian, artist, and educator; author of Modern Negro Art (1943).

George Schuyler

Journalist, satirist, and cultural critic.

Langston Hughes

Poet, playwright, novelist, and one of the central figures of the Harlem Renaissance.

African Heritage & Design

Aesthetic influence drawn from African art traditions, including motifs, textiles, masks, sculpture, and symbolic forms rooted in ancestral cultures across the African continent.

Naive Art (or Folk Art)

Art created by self-taught artists without formal academic training, often characterized by simplified figures, flat perspectives, and narrative content.

Urban Realism

A style that depicts life in cities with attention to working-class environments, social dynamics, and often racial or economic inequality.

Jazz & The Blues

While musical genres, Jazz and Blues also inspired visual art through their rhythms, improvisation, emotional range, and cultural symbolism.

Impressionism

A 19th-century European art movement known for its use of light, color, and loose brushwork to capture fleeting moments and atmospheric effects.

Cubism

A modernist movement (originated by Picasso and Braque) that deconstructed objects into geometric shapes and multiple perspectives.

Abstract Expressionism

A post-WWII movement characterized by gestural brushstrokes, abstraction, and emphasis on the artist’s inner emotional or spiritual state.