The Cleveland Museum of Art

Collection Online as of December 16, 2025

Vertically oriented black-ink print on beige paper depicting a person with dark skin tone from the waist up, right arm crossed over their chest as their shoulders hunch, other arm hanging down. They tilt their head down, eyes narrowed and looking up and out. They wear a loose-fitting long-sleeved shirt, have tightly coiled hair cropped closed to the scalp, with the right side of their face bathed in light and the right cast in shadow.

Sharecropper

1940

William E. Smith

(American, 1913–1997)
America, Ohio, Cleveland
linocut
Image: 20.4 x 15.4 cm (8 1/16 x 6 1/16 in.); Sheet: 28.6 x 23.8 cm (11 1/4 x 9 3/8 in.)
Gift of The Print Club of Cleveland 1940.76
© William E. Smith
Catalogue raisonné: Teller 18; Salsbury, Benay, and Kruse 110
Location: Not on view

Did You Know?

The artist wrote that he made this image hoping to “waken the people to the waste of the sharecropper system.”

Description

This print by William E. Smith was one of the first by any Black American artist to enter the CMA’s collection. It was purchased from the museum’s May Show, an annual exhibition highlighting regional contemporary art. Karamu Artists Inc. used this juried display to establish a reputation locally that they were then able to leverage into further opportunities. The praise that their prints received was widely noted at a time when Black artists were otherwise unrepresented in museums; as a critic for Cleveland’s historically Black newspaper, the Call and Post, noted, “A feeling of deep racial pride was mine as I noticed the names of [members of Karamu Artists Inc. in the galleries].”
  • William E. Smith Entry Card to 1940 May Show. Cleveland Museum of Art May Show Records, Cleveland Museum of Art Archives. archive.org
    Robinson, William H., et. al. Transformations in Cleveland Art, 1796-1946: Community and Diversity in Early Modern America. Cleveland, Ohio: Cleveland Museum of Art, 1996. Mentioned and Reproduced: p. 190-191, fig.196; Mentioned: p. 250, no. 182
    Salsbury, Britany, and Erin E. Benay. Karamu Artists Inc.: Printmaking, Race, and Community. Cleveland, OH: Cleveland Museum of Art, 2025. Reproduced: p. 48, no. 18
  • Karamu Artists Inc.: Printmaking, Race, and Community. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (March 23-August 17, 2025).
    Transformations in Cleveland Art, 1796-1946. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (May 19-July 21, 1996).
    The May Show: 22nd Annual Exhibition of Works by Cleveland Artists and Craftsmen. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (May 1-June 9, 1940).
  • {{cite web|title=Sharecropper|url=false|author=William E. Smith|year=1940|access-date=16 December 2025|publisher=Cleveland Museum of Art}}

Source URL:

https://www.clevelandart.org/art/1940.76