Ernest Barnes Research Paper

Words: 630
Pages: 3

Ernest Barnes: Paintings of Artistic Value Throughout the many years, historical artists have used their paintings as a symbol to interpret the social predicaments, mediocre lifestyles, yet remarkable milestones of certain modernist movements. Their goals were to create meaningful paintings that conveyed the actions of citizens’ lives, and give them a voice through the work they mastered. With these artistic paintings, especially those created by women and men of color, it was believed that they captured events that are historically known to the world today, and that those strategic events made them into the people they were. African American artists’ like Ernest Barnes Jr., was an exceptionally gifted painter, who influenced America through his works of African heritage. Ernest Eugene Barnes Jr. was born July 15, 1938 in Durham, NC, to Ernest Barnes Sr. and Fannie Greer during the unbearable Jim Crow Era. Jim Crow laws affected the way Ernest Barnes was brought up, because it strictly enforced segregation amongst blacks and whites. He attended North Carolina University on a full ride scholarship for football and majored in art. His father was a shipping clerk while his mother oversaw the housing staff of a prominent attorney. One day Ernest Barnes accompanied his mother to her job, and her boss Mr. …show more content…
The forms of his athletic paintings eyes were traditionally always closed. He thoroughly explained that, “I won’t paint people with their eyes open. We don’t see each other, we are blind to each other’s humanity (Gale, pg.3). The first painting that Barnes sold was when he was twenty-one, and later in November of 1966, he sold his first solo exhibition in the Grand Central Art Gallery (Ernie Barnes Family Trust,