Sale 2619 - Lot 33
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(PORTFOLIO) THE COMMITTEE FOR THE NEGRO IN THE ARTS
Art Workshop Folio.
Portfolio of 12 mimeographed prints (reproducing drawings) and typed introduction by Langston Hughes on newsprint paper, with the color screenprinted folio cover, 1952. Each 356x216 mm; 14x8 inches (sheet), loose as issued. Includes works by Roy DeCarava (2), Lorraine Clarke, Harold Collins, Jackie Edwards, Rudi Lesser, Earle Nixon (2), Keith Simons, Edward Strickland and Hartwell Yeargans (2).
Providence: the estate of the actor William Lee; private collection.
An extremely scarce portfolio of Harlem artists and an unusual document of the Art Chapter of the Committee for the Negro in the Arts. This promotional folio, wrote Langston Hughes in the introduction, was intended to make art accessible to a wider audience: "This portfolio will aid the people of Harlem and indeed of our whole city in learning that artists live among them and draw their subject matter from them." The Committee for the Negro in the Arts (CNA) was active from 1947 to 1954. It evolved out of the American Negro Theatre and was succeeded by the Harlem Writers Guild. In 1948, the CNA was designated a subversive organization by Attorney General Tom C. Clark. Despite political attacks, in the early 1950s, the CNA had extensive support in both the white and black arts community with such prominent members as Harry Belafonte, Aaron Copland, Alain Locke, Dorothy Parker and Charles White.
