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Builders

1929
Not on view
Wells’s Builders celebrates industrial labor and pays particular tribute to African American workers. Working in linocut, a medium for which an artist cuts into a soft linoleum sheet and can create curved and straight lines with equal ease, Wells made effective use of black ink with the white paper, a combination that here resonates with distinct racial implications. Rendered at heroic profile, the central and largest figure recalls the art of ancient Egypt, a frequent touchstone in painting, sculpture, and design in the 1920s. Wells made Builders in 1929, the year when he joined the faculty of Howard University in Washington, D.C., where he taught printmaking for the next forty years.

Artwork Details

Object Information
  • Title: Builders
  • Artist: James Lesesne Wells (American, Atlanta, Georgia 1902–1993 Washington, D.C.)
  • Date: 1929
  • Medium: Linocut
  • Dimensions: 19 13/16 × 16 1/4 in. (50.4 × 41.2 cm)
  • Classification: Prints
  • Credit Line: Gift of Reba and Dave Williams, 1999
  • Object Number: 1999.529.173
  • Curatorial Department: Modern and Contemporary Art

More Artwork

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Mill Workers, James Lesesne Wells American, Linocut
Mill Workers
James Lesesne Wells
ca. 1940
View of Ethiopia, James Lesesne Wells American, Woodcut
View of Ethiopia
James Lesesne Wells
1929 or earlier
Bus Stop, Ghana
James Lesesne Wells
1975
Journey to the Cross, James Lesesne Wells American, Etching
Journey to the Cross
James Lesesne Wells
ca. 1947–48
Primitive Girl, James Lesesne Wells American, Linocut
Primitive Girl
James Lesesne Wells
ca. 1940

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