Before the Blacklist: The Role of the New York Jazz Community Between the Harlem Renaissance and the McCarthy Era in Promoting Social Change through Radical Politics

2016 ◽  
Vol 56 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
New York ◽  
Social Change ◽  
Harlem Renaissance ◽  
Radical Politics ◽  
Mccarthy Era ◽  
The Harlem Renaissance

Sahdiji, an African Ballet (1931): Queer Connections and the “Myth of the Solitary Genius”

2008 ◽  
Vol 40 (S1) ◽  
pp. 95-105
Author(s):  
Victoria Phillips Geduld
Keyword(s):  
New York ◽  
Harlem Renaissance ◽  
Dance History ◽  
Alain Locke ◽  
Rite Of Spring ◽  
William Grant Still ◽  
The Harlem Renaissance

In May 1931 the ballet Sahdji premiered at the Eastman Theatre in Rochester, New York: with a libretto by Harlem Renaissance's Alain Locke and Richard Bruce Nugent, music by composer William Grant Still, the ballet by Thelma Biracree, and dedicated to the Eastman School's Howard Hanson, the work was set in Africa and performed by dancers in blackface. In 1934 the work was performed with an all-black cast in Chicago and revived in Rochester through 1950. Sahdji demonstrates that the participants shared two tenets: the desire to create high art, and the belief in African forms to achieve artistic aims. Locke and Nugent had a small shared world that included Lincoln Kirstein. Locke wrote about The Rite of Spring, and Sahdji became Locke's African answer to Spring. Sahdji begs for a reinvigoration of dance history that credits philosophical underpinnings of the American ballet to the Harlem Renaissance and its queer connections.

Doll's House/Dollhouse: Models and Agency

2017 ◽  
Vol 53 (1) ◽  
pp. 28-56 ◽  
Author(s):  
ANNABEL WHARTON
Keyword(s):  
New York ◽  
Twentieth Century ◽  
Harlem Renaissance ◽  
Gertrude Stein ◽  
Marcel Duchamp ◽  
Artistic Production ◽  
Arthur Danto ◽  
The City ◽  
The Harlem Renaissance

Models – economic, mathematical, toys, manikins – are ubiquitous. This article probes one model, the Stettheimer doll's house, in order to understand all models better. The Stettheimers, three wealthy unmarried sisters living in New York in the early the twentieth century, attracted a remarkable melange of Camp artists and writers, identified by Arthur Danto as “the American Bloomsbury.” The Stettheimers were involved in many of New York's happenings, including the Harlem Renaissance and the innovative stage productions of Gertrude Stein. Androgyny, excess, racial mixing and theatricality flourished in the Stettheimer milieu. Carrie Stettheimer's doll's house, now housed in the Museum of the City of New York, captured this life. I consider this model for two related purposes. First, and more narrowly, I document the various effects this eccentric doll's house had on the artistic production of those in its vicinity, most notably on the novels of her sister Ettie and on the paintings both of her sister Florine and Marcel Duchamp. Second, I use the evidence of the doll's house's affect to discuss the agency of models in general.

Fletcher Henderson

2018 ◽  
pp. 110-125
Author(s):  
Vic Hobson
Keyword(s):  
New York ◽  
Harlem Renaissance ◽  
Black Swan ◽  
Classical Education ◽  
The Harlem Renaissance

This chapter looks at Armstrong’s time in New York with Fletcher Henderson. Henderson’s more privileged background, his classical education, and his employment with Black Swan Records, all affected his approach to music and expose some of the tensions inherent in the Harlem Renaissance. Using the example of the stock arrangement of “Copenhagen” this chapter explores Armstrong’s development as a soloist in the context of Henderson’s orchestra. It explores how his solos were preformed prior to performance and only played with minor alterations in one performance or recording to the next. This chapter also discusses the differences between Eastern and Western style.

Harlem Renaissance Women and 580 St. Nicholas Avenue

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ethelene Whitmire
Keyword(s):  
New York ◽  
New York City ◽  
Los Angeles ◽  
York City ◽  
Harlem Renaissance ◽  
The United States ◽  
Office Worker ◽  
Pass Through ◽  
African American Artists ◽  
The Harlem Renaissance

This chapter looks at how Regina became part of the Harlem Renaissance upon her arrival in New York City. Events collided to put Regina at the forefront of the Harlem Renaissance, a cultural movement marked by increased literary, musical, and artistic creativity by African American artists who wanted to challenge the prevailing stereotypical representation of their image. Writers and artists came from all over the United States to participate. In Los Angeles, writer Wallace Thurman encouraged fellow post-office worker Arna Bontemps to go to Harlem. Opportunity editor Charles S. Johnson encouraged Zora Neale Hurston to move to New York City. All of these great thinkers, writers, and artists would pass through the 135th Street Branch, where Regina was assigned.

scholarly journals Queer Harlem, Queer Tashkent: Langston Hughes's “Boy Dancers of Uzbekistan”

Slavic Review ◽  
2017 ◽  
Vol 76 (3) ◽  
pp. 637-646
Author(s):  
Jennifer Wilson
Keyword(s):  
Central Asia ◽  
Black Community ◽  
Harlem Renaissance ◽  
Russian Revolution ◽  
Communities Of Color ◽  
Male Dancers ◽  
The Harlem Renaissance

In Langston Hughes's 1934 essay “Boy Dancers of Uzbekistan,” (published inTravelmagazine), the author writes mournfully about the Soviet reforms that put an end to the practice of effeminized male dancers,bachi, performing in the teahouses of Central Asia for exclusively male audiences; in doing so, Hughes expresses an enthusiasm for the queer contours of thebachitradition. This article connects that enthusiasm with Hughes's earlier involvement in cultural efforts aimed at increasing queer visibility within the black community during the Harlem Renaissance. By situating “Boy Dancers” in this context, the underexplored role of the Russian Revolution in fostering queer solidarity among global communities of color is highlighted.

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