The Negroes of Africa have by nature no feeling that rises above the trifling.” Immanuel Kant, in his essay, On Natural Characteristics continues to say, “…although many of them (Blacks) have even been set free, still not a single one was ever found who presented anything great in art or science or any other praise-worthy quality” (Kant, 1764). Yet, here am I, a Black/Negro Woman Artist over 300 years removed and I still cannot help but be aware that this type of thinking still exists in contemporary North American culture. Most discomforting is knowing that I exist in a place where my being an artist is burdened by the constant critique and badgering of the non-artist, European historian/philosopher who centuries ago created these terms and cultivated their meanings. It would be wishful thinking to assume I will ever present my own image absent this critique.

Heavily influenced by writings on self-portraiture by photographer Carla Williams, I am attracted to the idea that many women (Black women in particular) choose self-portraiture as a means of control. This obsession with control is a defense mechanism used as a direct response to Black women historically not being in the position to determine either their individual or collective images in the “popular consciousness” (Jewell, 1993). As a result, some women will fall into the shadows, attempting to preserve and conceal a part of the self that is abused, misunderstood, ashamed, embarrassed and afraid. This containment serves as both a positive and a negative. In order to prevent being completely consumed many Black women expose the minimum necessary with hopes of preserving the their most precious (Roberts, 1997).

However, in this process of self-censorship, are we also becoming so concerned with not revealing our most precious we are now concealing the most important? Is that not feeding the stereotype? Every woman has several aspects to her personality that mature into mask that aid her in functioning in a male dominated, media-fueled, hyper-sexed, perverse society, but these mask should not have to be hidden. I choose to make art while adapting a refreshed outlook that’s allows me to wear these masks for freedom of embracing their function.

Consequently, I can no longer afford to shy away from the more uncomfortable and sensitive subjects that present themselves in my imagery. African, Negro, Nigger, Black, African American...Woman, Inferior, Subordinate, Masculine, Weak, Vulnerable, Object. To think that I will EVER present my image absent these terms is both irrational and absurd, because not only do these term apply, but as exponents to my large 6’2”, 240 lb. athletic frame. In a 1988 interview with WRC-TV in Washington, sports commentator Jimmy Snyder was quoted as saying that during the Civil War, "'the slave owner would breed his big black with his big woman so that he would have a big black kid.” (www.ESPN.com, 1998).

Now, at the ripe age of 22, I have found myself investigating my image more intimately than ever before. Conscious of these issues, I have searched through every image I have taken of myself and those others have taken of me, trying to find single moments when I free myself from my stereotype, fall into it, model it, conformed to it and even reject it. “We experience our bodies in incongruous ways. The privacy of our sensations, the personal awareness derived from physical acts, the joys and pleasures aroused through intimate contact with other bodies teach us profound lessons about our personal identity and self-sufficiency. We experience our own body in ways that are unavailable to the inspection of others. Our pain or ecstasy is our own and known only second hand to those with whom we share its secrets. But our bodies also are in the world. The incongruity between personal lessons of self-sufficiency and public ones of insufficiency is transferred to the tension between domination and civilization in the civic realm. There we attempt to shape an arena that can protect us from our own weaknesses and those of others but also can accommodate our desire to turn toward those others and be open to experiencing them as the Other (Hauser, 1997).50In this private ritual, my questions I presume will unveil my true self.

Patricia Hill Collins responds to Kant’s claims in her essay Toward an Afrocentric Feminist Epistemology by presenting the idea of the “self-defined Black woman’s standpoint” as taking the authority to determine one’s own truths, birthed as a result of alternative epistemology. In doing so, Black women struggle to free themselves for the sake of individual uniqueness, an idea rooted in the tradition of African humanism. In doing so, one may arrive at a greater knowledge of self as part of one’s own distinctive expression of spirit, power, or energy that simultaneously evaluates character, values and ethics (Collins, 2004).

Kant’s writings on Practical Reason would suggest that a need to conduct such an in-depth series of self-evaluations would be part of a thought process he refers to as “resolution through reflection”. As part of this process, one would make assessments of their actions from a first person point of view, followed by reflections of what moved them to act. After this reflection gives rise to an intentional action, that individual would then modify not the action itself, but the objective of that action ending with some form of resolution (Kant 1788).

So then, my private ritual may indeed be my attempt at coming to personal resolution through repeated moments of intimate reflection. By documenting my image with the intent of coming to KNOW myself - my character, my likeness, my image - by looking at a series of faces, characters and masks of myself I hope to find freedom in both the similarities and the differences. Black feminist poet, Aundre Lorde argues that “the impoverished action of self-love lies at the heart of oppression…reclaiming the domain of exploration, pleasure and human agency is thus vital to individual empowerment. Despite these challenges, for African Americans, the struggle is essential” (Collins, 2004).

Kant’s observations on the national characteristics of people of African descent is evident in his distaste for giving such attention to the self when he said, “The blacks are very vain but in a Negro’s way.” Such vanity would despise Kant’s moral law, making Blacks not only vain, savage, trifling and ignorant but immoral and tasteless. In that regard, it would be impossible for any Black person, especially not a Black woman to be successful in the world of fine art Kant, 1764).

It is disheartening to think my self-portraits stand the chance of being decoded as a mere platform for vanity, narcissism and egotism. By embracing my creative methodology as a young woman who is able to move through life unashamed of change, I am exposing what most women would rather ignore, in an attempt to find ME and KNOW me through these changing masks of personality, whether ugly, unclothed, costumed, scarred, fragmented, adorned with jewelry or painted Black. Therefore, as important as the imagery is, so will be my personal intellect and educating when discussing it. I believe David Hume would support me being educated in this sense considering his thoughts on “low people without education.” In his writing, “Negroes…Naturally Inferior to the Whites”, he mentioned hearing “talk of one Negro as a man of parts and learning…likely to be admired for [his] slender accomplishments, like a parrot who speaks a few words plainly” (Hume, 1711).

As I mature, may I, my words, my image retain substance.

Bibliography Wells, Liz. “Photography: A Critical Introduction.” Routledge, 2004 Hume, David “Negroes…naturally inferior to the Whites.” B. Edinburgh, 26 April 1711. Kant, Immanuel. “On National Characteristics, so far as they depend upon the Distinct Feeling of the Beautiful and Sublime”. 1764. Kant, Immanuel. “The Critique of Practical Reason”. 1788. Collins, Patricia Hill. “Why Black Sexual Politics?” & “Prisons for our Bodies, Closets for our Minds.” New York: Routledge, 2004. Gilroy, Paul. Against Race: Imagining Political Culture Beyond the Color Line. By Paul Gilroy. Cambridge, Mass.: The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 2000. Roberts, Dorothy. Killing the Black Body: Race, Reproduction, and the Meaning of Liberty. Pantheon Books, 1997. K. Sue Jewell, From Mammy to Miss America and Beyond: Cultural Images and the Shaping of U.S. Social Policy, London: Routledge 1993. http://espnet.sportszone.com/editors/nfl/news/0421greek.html cited on 5 February 1998. Gerard Hauser, guest editor, "The Body As Source And Site Of Argument," from a call for papers, Argumentation & Advocacy journal, sent as an e-mail 13 November 1997.