A Life on Paper: The Drawings and Lithographs of John Thomas Biggers

CHAPTER FOUR: Africa and Post-Africa, 1957–1974

I Africa and Post-Africa: 1957–1974 FINDING THE MISSING PIECES CHAPTER FOUR deas for drawings originate from many sources, just as do pieces of a quilt. They might emerge from the depths of an artist’s emotional memories and fantasies or from a draftsman’s powers of observation. The drawings that have been selected for the past three chapters have been expressionistic, emotional, and have come from inner memory as much as a reporter’s observations. Throughout the first several decades of his career, Biggers’s images were deep and somber impressions of the downtrodden, tragic expressions of the human condition. When asked about this characteristic feature of his early work, Biggers explained that he felt that it was absolutely necessary to show his feelings about what happens to people in poverty. “This to me is what art is all about—showing the spirit of man struggling above the mundane, above the material, above suffering.”1 The influence of Viktor Lowenfeld can perhaps be understood by reviewing Lowenfeld’s concept of haptic and visual approaches to drawing and painting: Visual artists use their eyes first, focusing on accuracy of visual perceptions. Haptic artists respond to visual stimuli with their feelings. Because John focused so strongly on the emotional quality of his work, Lowenfeld was convinced that 56 AFRICA AND POST-AFRICA: 1957–1974 Biggers was a natural haptic artist who perceived with his feelings. He encouraged the young artist to find his own way, regardless of differences from the other students. Biggers recalled an incident as a student at Hampton in which he was trying to paint like those he admired. “Viktor said that I didn’t have to paint like the others, that I was painting from my feelings, as a haptic. It’s important to know what you are… Some days I am more visual than other days… for some people, the eyes are the real vehicles. For others, feeling is everything.”2 The trip to Africa from July through December 1957 transformed Biggers’s work. While the emotional content was still important, the drawings became lighter , brighter, and more visual as he drank in the spirit of the newly independent land. The resulting drawings were sensitively realistic in tone, rather than sorrowfully expressionistic. His fellowship from UNESCO was awarded to study the traditional life in Ghana and Nigeria and record his observations, and this certainly suggested a different approach to Biggers. Though the continent of Africa had been an active part of his imagination for some time, the reality was overwhelming to him, far beyond his expectations. He strengthened his skills of observation with on-site drawing, journals, and photographs, recording what he saw. Several experiences impressed him greatly. As he drew people, he was often reminded of the faces that he knew from home. But in Ghanan people, he also found great dignity, strength, and maturity of character in those he encountered. The personalities, he noted, seemed different from some at home. In his 1962 book, Ananse: The Web of Life in Africa, the record of his African trip, he observed that at home he had been accustomed to living among “inhibited people and warped personalities.”3 In 1957, the journey to Africa was a remarkable undertaking for a young black couple from the United States. At the time of their first trip, few black Americans had traveled to Ghana. Because the former Gold Coast, now Ghana, was an early slave transport state, even fewer chose to visit that area. Alex Haley’s powerful book Roots had not yet been written and would not be published for twenty 57 AFRICA AND POST-AFRICA: 1957–1974 years. How prescient John Biggers had been to seek his African roots in 1957. He and Hazel returned to Africa three more times over the years. The artist spent the rest of his life blending his understanding of Africa into his art and beliefs. The first stop of the journey was Accra, the capital of Ghana. From there John and Hazel were taken to the College of Technology, near Kumasi, Ghana. Their first host was Patrick Hulede, a member of the art faculty. Biggers was struck by the secure confidence expressed by African men and the central strength of the matriarchal spirit as the mother of mankind, expressed in the word maame. This drawing of a strong-jawed Patrick Hulede and his vibrantly erect mother (fig...