Archibald Motley was a painter that painted primarily during the time period of the Black Renaissance. He was born in New Orleans, but then moved to Chicago during the Great Migration. He mostly painted scenes of people of color in normal life, but also painted privately commissioned portraits. Motley lived in Bronzeville, which is a primarily African-American neighborhood. He was one of the first African-American painters, and he was fairly successful. Whilst Archibald Motley tried to do many things in his artwork, Motley fought to destroy stereotypes through his artwork. Archibald Motley's life caused him to want to destroy stereotypes and portray people of color as he did. Unfortunately, growing up in New Orleans and Chicago, Archibald Motley learned first hand about the racial segregation and the social prejudices against…show more content… His goal was to show people of color as they really were, and to dispel stereotypes about people of color. In Nightlife, Motley portrays POC having fun, and not in poverty and disadvantaged situations, like many 19th century paintings did. Motley was one of the first painters to paint people of color as an equal racial group, as opposed to other painters that had portrayed them as inferior. He also used all sorts of colors, from reds to greens in his art in place of conventional skin colors. Wikipedia states it well, "By painting the differences in their skin tones, Motley is also attempting to bring out the differences in personality of his subjects. It could be interpreted that through this differentiating, Motley is asking white viewers not to lump all African Americans into the same category or stereotype, but to get to know each of them as individuals before making any judgments (Wikipedia, Archibald Motley)." In this way, Motley is using his artistic license to use color to deter stereotypes and to eliminate some form of racism from in his
