Painting the Gospel: Black Public Art and Religion in Chicago
Kymberly N. Pinder
Abstract
Innovative and lavishly illustrated, this book offers an indispensable contribution to conversations about black art, theology, politics, and identity in Chicago. It escorts readers on an eye-opening odyssey to the murals, stained glass, and sculptures dotting the city's black churches and neighborhoods. Moving from Chicago's oldest black Christ figure to contemporary religious street art, the book explores ideas like blackness in public, art for black communities, and the relationship of Afrocentric art to Black Liberation Theology. It also focuses attention on art excluded from scholarship d ... More
Innovative and lavishly illustrated, this book offers an indispensable contribution to conversations about black art, theology, politics, and identity in Chicago. It escorts readers on an eye-opening odyssey to the murals, stained glass, and sculptures dotting the city's black churches and neighborhoods. Moving from Chicago's oldest black Christ figure to contemporary religious street art, the book explores ideas like blackness in public, art for black communities, and the relationship of Afrocentric art to Black Liberation Theology. It also focuses attention on art excluded from scholarship due to racial or religious particularity. Throughout, the book reflects on the myriad ways private black identities assert public and political goals through imagery. The book includes maps and tour itineraries that allow readers to make conceptual, historical, and geographical connections among the works.
Keywords:
blackness,
black art,
black theology,
black politics,
black identity,
Afrocentric art,
Chicago,
Black Liberation Theology,
murals,
stained glass
Bibliographic Information
Print publication date: 2016 |
Print ISBN-13: 9780252039928 |
Published to Illinois Scholarship Online: April 2017 |
DOI:10.5406/illinois/9780252039928.001.0001 |