For over two decades, African American artist Kara Walker (b. 1969) has been making work that weaves together imagery from the antebellum South, the brutality of slavery, and racist stereotypes.

For over two decades, African American artist Kara Walker (b. 1969) has been making work that weaves together imagery from the antebellum South, the brutality of slavery, and racist stereotypes. Her work has stirred controversy for its use of exaggerated caricatures that reflect long-standing racialized and gendered stereotypes and for its lurid depictions of history.

Harper’s Pictorial History of the Civil War (Annotated) is a series of 15 prints based on the two-volume anthology published in 1866. Walker’s work comments on the omission of African Americans from this narrative and urges viewers to consider the persistence of violent caricature and stereotype today. To create her prints, Walker enlarged select illustrations and then overlaid them with large stenciled figures. The silhouettes visually disrupt the scenes and suffuse them with scenarios evocative of the painful past left out of Harper’s original images. Traveling from the Smithsonian American Art Museum, the Center for Women’s History contextualizes the exhibition with objects, images, and documents from New-York Historical’s collections.

Kara Walker: Harper’s Pictorial History of the Civil War (Annotated) is organized by the Smithsonian American Art Museum. Coordinated at New-York Historical by Center for Women’s History fellows Allison Robinson, Mellon Foundation postdoctoral fellow in women's history and public history, and Ksenia M. Soboleva, Mellon Foundation gender and LGBTQ+ history fellow



Exhibitions at New-York Historical are made possible by Dr. Agnes Hsu-Tang and Oscar Tang, the Saunders Trust for American History, the Evelyn & Seymour Neuman Fund, the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs in partnership with the City Council, and the New York State Council on the Arts with the support of the Office of the Governor and the New York State Legislature. WNET is the media sponsor.