By Ellen C. Caldwell
for JSTOR Daily
Artist Betye Saar is known for creating small altars that commemorate and question issues of both time and remembrance, race and gender, and personal and public spaces. College art history surveys often cover Saar’s 1972 assemblage box The Liberation of Aunt Jemima as a pivotal point of momentum in the contemporary feminist art scene and/or African-American art scene of the ‘60s and ‘70s. But Saar has always been hesitant to accept such categorical designations. Through her art, Saar has had a lasting influence upon the art world today.
With The Liberation of Aunt Jemima, Saar took a well known stereotype and caricature of Aunt Jemima, the breakfast food brand’s logo, and armed her with a gun in one hand and a broom in the other. Saar lined the base of the box with cotton. The surrounding walls feature tiled images of Aunt Jemima sourced from product boxes. She places a figurine of Jemima in the center as a Black Panther leader, modeled after Huey Newton’s iconic portrait. In Saar’s words, “I take the figure that classified all black women and make her into one of the leaders of the revolution–although she is a pretty strong character anyway.” Her work can be defined by its biting humor and forceful, subversive messages.
In an article for Feminist Studies, Josephine Withers providesa comprehensive history of Saar’s earlier boxes and their transformation from public discourse to one of personal reflection and exploration. Withers integrates Saar’s words and goals throughout, exploring and explaining the artist’s motivations to reappropriate and redefine Aunt Jemima. Also included is an examination of her later work, which deals with more personal topics like her divorce that used as its medium personal family heirlooms…