Email this article Interpreting Space: Ethiopia Awakening and the Rebirth of Meta Warrick Fuller
Abstract
Scholars have regarded the art of Meta Warrick Fuller as a key element both in the canon of African American art and the Harlem Renaissance. Fuller’s sculpture, Ethiopia Awakening, has been particularly highlighted for it symbolism of the Egyptian lineage of African Americans, as well as its representational qualities of an emerging African American society. In this paper, I redirect the scholarly discussion of Ethiopia Awakening to demonstrate that it was not the only subject matter that catapulted the sculpture to fame but also, critically, its placement in the space of a national exposition.
In the America’s Making Exposition held in New York City during 1921, fuller demonstrated her awareness of the ways locating her sculpture within the installation space engaged the politics of representation of race and gender in the nation. Using the scholarship of Time Cresswell and Steven Dubin, and comparing the installation of her work in the 1921 exposition with that of prior exhibitions, I analyze the cultural and social significance of fuller’s efforts to position her work to dominate space in the exposition, thus rendering it visible in ways advantageous to her agendas – ranging from bringing the struggle of African Americans in Western society in the early 1900s to prominence in national discourses, to personal struggles. In the America’s Making Exposition, they align in Ethiopia Awakening thus place, rendering it both a narrative sculpture and self-portrait.
In the America’s Making Exposition held in New York City during 1921, fuller demonstrated her awareness of the ways locating her sculpture within the installation space engaged the politics of representation of race and gender in the nation. Using the scholarship of Time Cresswell and Steven Dubin, and comparing the installation of her work in the 1921 exposition with that of prior exhibitions, I analyze the cultural and social significance of fuller’s efforts to position her work to dominate space in the exposition, thus rendering it visible in ways advantageous to her agendas – ranging from bringing the struggle of African Americans in Western society in the early 1900s to prominence in national discourses, to personal struggles. In the America’s Making Exposition, they align in Ethiopia Awakening thus place, rendering it both a narrative sculpture and self-portrait.