Elizabeth Catlett was an African- American artist who used
paintings, sculptures, and prints to explore the realm of race and feminism. Born
on April 15, 1915 in Washington D.C., she received a scholarship to attend the
Carnegie Institute of Technology-Pittsburgh, but because of her race, she had
her offer revoked. She then moved on to Howard University and the University of
Iowa where she studied under Grant Hill and became the first African-American
woman to graduate with an MFA in sculpture. Catlett spent the duration of her
life using her art to bring life to the struggles of African-American people. She
created realistic two- and three-dimensional figures with subjects ranging from
maternal images to symbols of the Black Power movement, portraits of Martin
Luther King Jr., and even writer Phyllis Wheatley. Splitting her time between New York and
Mexico, she drew inspiration from not only African-American life, but Mexican
life as well. She even went on to join the Taller de Gráfica Popular, a sociopolitical
group of print making artists.
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