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Artworks

Trash, 1971

  • Artist

    Benny Andrews

  • Title

    Trash

  • Date

    1971

  • Medium

    Oil and mixed media collage on canvas

  • Dimensions

    Overall: 120 × 336 in. (304.8 × 853.4 cm)

  • Credit line

    The Studio Museum in Harlem; gift of Mr. and Mrs. Stanley Katz, New York

  • Object Number

    1981.14.1a-l

Here, three Black men laboriously pull a seemingly endless caravan of representations of societal ills to a dumping ground. Comprised of twelve canvasses, Trash reveals Benny Andrews’s frustration with the state of the nation, with references to the Ku Klux Klan, patriotism, incarceration, and labor, among other themes. The painting is part of "The Bicentennial Series", a six-year series begun in 1970 as a preemptive response to what Andrews accurately predicted would be the exclusion of African-American history and culture from the 1976 U.S. bicentennial celebrations.


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Artworks

Trash, 1971

  • Artist

    Benny Andrews

  • Title

    Trash

  • Date

    1971

  • Medium

    Oil and mixed media collage on canvas

  • Dimensions

    Overall: 120 × 336 in. (304.8 × 853.4 cm)

  • Credit line

    The Studio Museum in Harlem; gift of Mr. and Mrs. Stanley Katz, New York

  • Object Number

    1981.14.1a-l

Here, three Black men laboriously pull a seemingly endless caravan of representations of societal ills to a dumping ground. Comprised of twelve canvasses, Trash reveals Benny Andrews’s frustration with the state of the nation, with references to the Ku Klux Klan, patriotism, incarceration, and labor, among other themes. The painting is part of "The Bicentennial Series", a six-year series begun in 1970 as a preemptive response to what Andrews accurately predicted would be the exclusion of African-American history and culture from the 1976 U.S. bicentennial celebrations.


Explore further