Old Church

Portfolio TitleSelections from the Atlanta Period

Artist Hale Woodruff (American, 1900 - 1980)

Printer Robert Blackburn's Printmaking Workshop (American)

Date1931-1940; printed 1996

MediumLinocut on lana royal bright white thai mulberry chin colle paper

DimensionsImage: 6 1/2 × 9 inches (16.51 × 22.86 cm)
Sheet: 19 1/8 × 14 13/16 inches (48.58 × 37.62 cm)

Credit LinePurchase: acquired through the generosity of The Print Society in honor of Dr. Leo Goertz and gift of Auldlyn Higgins Williams and E.T. Williams Jr. of Sag Harbor, N.Y.

Object number2018.4.4

SignedA blind stamp of the Blackburn emblem at the bottom left edge. The artist's blind stamp at the bottom right edge, "(C) Hale Woodruff"

Inscribed"13/75" in pencil at the bottom left corner

On View

Not on view

Collections

American Art

Terms

DescriptionThe horizontally oriented black-and-white print Old Church depicts a dilapidated building that dominates the composition. The structure is seen from the side. It has a doorway with four steps leading up to it at the left, a rickety element that looks like a bell tower above and just to the right of the door, and five windows with mullions. An element that appears to be a chimney is positioned on the roof above the fourth window from the left. The building itself rests on a series of short piers that extend from what appears to be long grasses that the artist rendered using the white of the paper. An outhouse-type structure, propped up with a long board-like element sits atop a steep hill at the left side of the composition in the background. Long, striated clouds occupy sky. Like the grasses, they are created by the uninked paper.Gallery Label

Gallery Label

Hale Aspacio Woodruff frequently addressed the plight of African Americans in the segregated South. Churches, such as the one depicted in Old Church, were the cornerstones in many Black communities—places of worship, assembly, and refuge.

Provenance

Auldlyn Higgins Williams and E.T. Williams, Jr., Sag Harbor, NY, 1996–2018;

Their gift to The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, MO, February 2018.

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