Artwork Page for Politics

Details / Information for Politics

Politics

1940

William E. Smith

(American, 1913–1997)
Culture
Medium
linocut
Measurements
Image: 22.3 x 17.3 cm (8 3/4 x 6 13/16 in.); Sheet: 29.5 x 24.1 cm (11 5/8 x 9 1/2 in.)
Credit Line
Severance and Greta Millikin Trust 2022.57
Catalogue raisonné
Teller 25; Salsbury, Benay, and Kruse 108
Edition
10
Copyright
© William E. Smith
This artwork is known to be under copyright.
Location
Not on view
Print
?

Did You Know?

This print was included in a 1942 exhibition of Karamu House artists organized at New York’s Associated American Artists Galleries and sponsored by a committee including cultural figures such as Langston Hughes, Alain Locke, and Carl Van Vechten. The show traveled to Philadelphia’s Temple University and brought national attention to the Karamu House printmaking workshop.

Description

Although William E. Smith frequently addressed social issues in his prints, this linocut is among his most explicit political commentary. Here, Smith focuses on a cluster of men, spotlit in an alley debating politics. The figures’ varied expressions suggest the artist’s disappointment that “the fellow that [talks] the loudest . . . too often controls aspects of our life."

Politics

1940

William E. Smith

(American, 1913–1997)

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