Born to laborer parents in Topeka, Kansas, Aaron Douglas (1899–1979) overcame many obstacles to follow his passion for art and his desire for equality. After relocating to Harlem at twenty-six, he became one of the first artists to put African aesthetic influences and African American life, labor, and freedom at the center of modern art. Douglas was a true pioneer during a critical period of American history; his ambitious pursuit of justice through the paintbrush continues to inspire artists today.

In 1925, after earning a B.F.A. degree from the University of Nebraska then teaching at an elite, all-black high school in Kansas City, Douglas migrated to New York to join the cultural flourishing that has been called the New Negro Movement or the Harlem Renaissance. The young artists, writers, and musicians he met there believed creative expression could help define a unique racial identity and simultaneously bridge the divide between black and white communities. In a distinct style based on silhouetted figures and fractured space, Douglas began creating images that evoked the harsh realities of African-American life as well as hopes for a better future. Douglas later taught art for three decades at Fisk University, a historically black college in Nashville, where he influenced several generations of gifted artists.

Throughout his career Douglas projected a dignified voice of opposition and aspiration through his powerful imagery. This exhibition is the first nationally touring retrospective to celebrate the art and legacy of Aaron Douglas who is today considered the foremost visual artist of the Harlem Renaissance and “the father of Black American art.”

The exhibition includes approximately 100 paintings, works on paper, and book illustrations.

For additional information, view the Aaron Douglas Gallery Guide.


Special thanks to The Danner Foundation for supporting this exhibition.

Design Sponsor: 


Organized by the Spencer Museum of Art, the University of Kansas, Lawrence, with support from the Henry Luce Foundation and the National Endowment for the Arts.



Suggested Reading List for Aaron Douglas: African American Modernist

Exhibition Catalogue:
Susan Earle, ed. Aaron Douglas: African American Modernist. New Haven: Yale
University Press, 2007.

Baker, Houston A., Jr. Modernism and the Harlem Renaissance. Chicago: University of
Chicago Press, 1987.

Gottschild, Brenda Dixon. Waltzing in the Dark: African American Vaudeville and Race
Politics in the Swing Era. New York: Palgrave, 2002.

Hughes, Langston. The Big Sea: An Autobiography. New York: Knopf, 1940.

------ I Wonder As I Wander: An Autobiographical Journey. New York: Rinehart, 1956.

------ The Weary Blues. New York: Knopf, 1926.

Huggins, Nathan Irwin, ed. Voices from the Harlem Renaissance. New York: Oxford
University Press, 1995, 1994.

Hurston, Zora Neal. Their Eyes Were Watching God. New York: Harper Collins, 2002.

Johnson, James Weldon. God’s Trombones: Seven Negro Sermons in Verse. New York:
Viking, 1927.

Kirschke, Amy Helene. Aaron Douglas: Art, Race, and the Harlem Renaissance.
Jackson: University Press of Mississippi, 1995.

Krasner, David. A Beautiful Pageant: African American Theatre, Drama, and
Performance in the Harlem Renaissance, 1910–1920. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2002.

Locke, Alain. The Negro in Art: A Pictorial Record of the Negro Artist and the Negro
Theme in Art. Washington, D.C.: Associates in Negro Folk Education, 1940.

------- The New Negro: An Interpretation. New York: Arno Press, 1968.

Nadell, Martha Jane. Enter the New Negroes: Images of Race in American Culture.
Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2004.

Powell, Richard J. Black Art and Culture in the 20th Century. London: Thames and
Hudson, 1997.

Powell, Richard J., and David A. Bailey. Rhapsodies in Black: Art of the Harlem
Renaissance. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1997.




Image: Aaron Douglas. United States (1899-1979). Aspiration, 1936. Oil on canvas, 60 x 60 in. (152.4 x 152.4 cm). Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco, Museum purchase, the estate of Thurlow E. Tibbs, Jr., the Museum Society Auxiliary, American Art Trust Fund, Unrestricted Trust Fund, partial gift of Dr. Ernest A. Bates, Sharon Bell, Jo-Ann Beverly, Barbara Carleton, Dr. and Mrs. Arthur H. Coleman, Dr. and Mrs. Coyness Ennix, Jr., Nicole Y. Ennix, Mr. and Mrs. Gary Francois, Dennis L. Franklin, Mr. and Mrs. Maxwell C. Gillette, Mr. and Mrs. Richard Goodyear, Zuretti L. Goosby, Marion E. Greene, Mrs. Vivian S. W. Hambrick, Laurie Gibbs Harris, Arlene Hollis, Louis A. and Letha Jeanpierre, Daniel and Jackie Johnson, Jr., Stephen L. Johnson, Mr. and Mrs. Arthur Latham, Lewis & Ribbs Mortuary Garden Chapel, Glenn R. Nance, Mr. and Mrs. Harry S. Parker III, Mr. and Mrs. Carr T. Preston, Fannie Preston, Pamela R. Ransom, Dr. and Mrs. Benjamin F. Reed, San Francisco Black Chamber of Commerce, San Francisco Chapter of The Links, Inc., San Francisco Chapter of the NAACP, Sigma Pi Phi Fraternity, Dr. Ella Mae Simmons, Mr. Calvin R. Swinson, Joseph B. Williams, Mr. and Mrs. Alfred S. Wilsey, and the people of the Bay Area, 1997.84