Originally published by Trendependent.com, 6/2021.
Second part in a four-part series.
Prominent American Painter, Professor and Activist, Jacob Armistead Lawrence was born in Atlantic City, NJ in the Summer of 1917. There was a formative transition happening in America at the time of Lawrence’s birth, one of the most significant was the great Black American migration (1915-1950’s.) Millions of men, women and children travelled in droves from their oppressive and impoverished rural lives in the Jim Crow south to a more promising life in the industrialized Midwestern and Northeastern states; they were all in search of their promised 40 acres and a mule. As a matter of fact, Lawrence’s poignant sixty panel series the migration series (1940/41) details his impression of the monumental exodus that changed the course of American Black life.
Lawrence’s parents (Jacob Sr. & Rosa Lee) met and married in Atlantic City, New Jersey following their own individual great northern moves. His mother was from Virginia and his father from South Carolina. The young hopefuls only stayed in NJ for two years before moving on to (coal mining town) Easton, Pennsylvania in search of work (1919.) Unfortunately, Jacob sr. and Rosa Lee were not together very long before splitting up. Jacob Lawrence was just seven years old when his father abandoned their family in 1924. Pregnant with her third child William, Mrs. Lawrence moved Jacob Jr. and his younger sister Geraldine to Philadelphia shortly after her husband left. She tried her best to provide for her children, but her husband’s leaving left their family financially strangled. The sudden shift in the family dynamic, forced Mrs. Lawrence to place her three children into the Philadelphia Department of Welfare Foster Care system from 1927 – 1930. Lawrence stated during an interview with Carroll Green, “I think my mother had quite a hard time with us because she had no one to help her support us – when we were placed with the Department of Welfare.”
It was a rough time for the Lawrence family while they were separated from their mother, but the children always hoped their mother would return for them, and, she did. By age thirteen Lawrence and his two siblings were reunited with their mother in Harlem, NYC! It was during the lean depression years that the eager family arrived in Harlem, but the energy amongst the natives was very exciting in 1931. The people, the colors, and all the tall busy scenes were simply amazing to the impressionable young children! Sure, there were tenements and questionable corners containing pockets of various nefarious characters, but young Jacob had never seen black people and black culture so vibrant and so hopeful. Lawrence had arrived in Harlem on the tales of the Harlem Renaissance; the revolutionary creative allegiance that dramatically altered Black-American society, history, culture, and politics.
Later on Lawrence’s affiliations with artists/teachers Augustus Savage and Charles Alston, enabled him to spend valuable learning time with other members from the collective, such as: poet Claude McKay, Langston Hughes, writer Zora Neale Hurston, Romare Beardon and scholar, W. E. B. Dubois. Harlem’s Black creative forefathers kept Lawrence spellbound. He didn’t quite understand the rapid newness that he was experiencing, but he knew he appreciated it. Eventually, so did his mother. Harlem appeared to be a bodacious mixture of angst and flow to young Lawrence. He absorbed the hustle and bustle of the historic Northern Manhattan corner block by dynamic block. I believe he viewed Harlem as a cauldron of artists, intellectuals, politicos and neighbors to absorb from. The growing criminal element concerned Mrs. Lawrence, so she decided to sign her children up for the Utopia Children’s Center. It was a government funded recreation center (housed within the tenement complex the family lived in) that offered an after-school Arts & Crafts program.
Mrs. Lawrence believed it was a great way to keep her children safe while she was at work. It was there that Jacob’s love for Art making began. Mrs. Lawrence established a relationship with the church for her family as well. She was a Baptist with the Harlem cornerstone, Abyssinian Baptist Church, during Reverend Adam Clayton Powell JR’s reign. It was the largest Black Protestant congregation in America at the time. Jacob Lawrence admitted “attending church diligently for five years” before losing interest around 17 or 18 years old.
Mrs. Lawrence strived to keep her family immersed in all things hopeful and prosperous, to ward off the stings of being a single black mother raising three children in America (alone) during the depression. When the Depression became more acute, Lawrence’s mother lost her job and the family had to go on welfare. After his father deserted the family, Jacob Lawrence felt that it was his responsibility to help his mother provide for his younger siblings. So, he left Commerce High School for a while before junior year to enroll in the Civilian Conservation Corps (The New Deal Jobs program.) He was assigned Upstate New York (Catskills) to plant trees, drain swamps and build dams. His financial contributions to his family during this period helped out a great deal. By the time he turned 17 years old the economy slightly shifted in the right direction, enabling his mother’s return to full time work. As soon as Lawrence returned to Harlem, his art making resumed.
Eventually his yearning to make art started to outgrow his need for traditional school, so he withdrew. Over the next several years, he sought out art education and training only. This led to connections to pertinent artists with links to several opportunities, including: the brilliant artists Augusta Savage (1900-1962) and Charles Alston (1907-1977) they were two of the main actors in his technical development. Mr. Lawrence stated, “We looked up to them. They often gave us art materials, instruction and a place to paint.” Savage played a pivotal role in securing him an official membership with the Works Progress Administration (WPA) Artists Project. It was his first paying gig as an artist! Amidst his meteoric success Jacob met and married his wife Gwendolyn Knight (1913-2008) in 1941. They met in 1940 while working on Lawrence’s definitive artwork, the Migration Series (1940/41.) The couple’s courtship was slow and steady, allowing it to grow over each panel. Mr. Lawrence stated, “she’s been a big help to me in my work as a critic whom I respect. It’s been a good relationship. Surely artistically it’s been excellent.” Their lives shared parallel spaces that complimented one another. She supported and contributed to his illustrious career, and he didn’t overshadow hers. Mrs. Lawrence stated: “My life with Jacob allowed me to work as I pleased.
I’ve never felt overlooked. I’ve been lucky.” It seems they both provided the right amount of love, understanding and strength they each needed from a partner in order for their unbreakable bond to survive the fifty-nine years they were together. She respected him and he definitely respected her. They always left their egos outside of their personal and work relationships. Mr. Lawrence always referred to his wife as a “very serious artist.” After the Migration Series made its debut in the art world, his career skyrocketed practically overnight. Offers for the 23-year-old Lawrence started pouring in, and he was being pulled in every direction. At the outbreak of World War II, Lawrence was drafted into the United States Coast Guard (1943.) He was stationed in Florida and Massachusetts. After spending two years in the Military, he returned home to his wife and his work. While his career was still flourishing, his emotional state was not. Jacob Lawrence suffered a psychiatric breakdown, and was checked into Hillside Hospital in Queens, NY for Depression (1945.) He stayed in treatment for well over a year. Gwendolyn Lawrence was at his side throughout the traumatic ordeal.
When he was released, she was there to continue on with the pieces of Jacob Lawrence that never faltered or left him. I believe if we study his work closely, the answers to his emotional darkness lie within it. He was a keen student of expressionism.
Jacob Lawrence was a master artist, teacher, social activist and family man that went on to mentor and develop several dynamic artists, including his current exhibition mate Derek Adams. Although his wife’s career never experienced the same acclaim, he always referred to her as “a very serious artist” who mirrored his magnitude and appeared to be the pin in his support system. They spent 29 of their 59 years together in Harlem, NYC, and the remaining thirty years in their adopted home of Seattle, Washington. Jacob Lawrence was known as a gentle-man and creative giant that left an indelible mark on the art world and humanity. His life and work continue to be celebrated and re-imagined on the highest of levels by contemporary artists year after year. In his later years, Mr. Lawrence’s health started to drastically decline due to lung cancer. He died on June 9, 2000. He was 82. Gwendolyn followed on February 18th, 2005. He continued to paint up until two weeks before his death.
