Kerry James Marshall: Harriet Tubman
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About
Kerry James Marshall explains his decision to paint Harriet Tubman alongside her first husband John Tubman.
TRANSCRIPT
- We think of Harriet Tubman
- as a kind of mythic figure
- within black history—
- as a leader of the underground railroad,
- That’s what we think about
- We never think about Harriet Tubman
- Take those two things:
- her role in black history
- and her identity as a woman.
- Those things can both be dealt with;
- with the blackness of that figure
- representing the larger sort of mythic implication,
- and then the naming
- of herself and the seeing of her
- with a man who was a husband.
taking slaves from slavery to freedom.
when we think about Harriet Tubman.
as a woman who was married to anybody.
That becomes the kind of personal idea of Harriet Tubman.