Augusta Savage
The Shape of a Sculptor's Life
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- $13.99
Publisher Description
This powerful biography in poems tells the life of Augusta Savage, the trailblazing artist and pillar of the Harlem Renaissance.
A Claudia Lewis Award Winner for Poetry by the Bank Street College of Education
A Black Caucus ALA Children & Young Adult Award Winner
A CCBC Children’s Choice • A CBC Teacher Favorite
Augusta Savage was arguably the most influential American artist of the 1930s. A gifted sculptor, Savage was commissioned to create a portrait bust of W.E.B. Du Bois for the New York Public Library. She flourished during the Harlem Renaissance, and became a teacher to an entire generation of African American artists, including Jacob Lawrence, and would go on to be nationally recognized as one of the featured artists at the 1939 World’s Fair. She was the first-ever recorded Black gallerist. After being denied an artists’ fellowship abroad on the basis of race, Augusta Savage worked to advance equal rights in the arts. And yet popular history has forgotten her name.
Deftly written and brimming with photographs of Savage’s stunning sculpture, this is an important portrait of an exceptional artist who, despite the limitations she faced, was compelled to forge a life through art and creativity.
Features an afterword by the curator of the Art & Artifacts Division of the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture.
NAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY Horn Book • Kirkus Reviews • School Library Journal • Bank Street College
★ "A stunning portrait of artistic genius and Black history in America." —Booklist, starred review
★ "A wonderful addition to young people’s literature on African American artists." —Horn Book, starred review
★ "In a rich biography in verse, Nelson (A is for Oboe) gives voice to the Black sculptor Augusta Savage (1892-1962), a key Harlem Renaissance figure." —Publishers Weekly, starred review
★ "Nelson’s arresting poetry, which is accompanied by photographs of Savage’s work, dazzles as it experiments with form. … A lyrical biography from a master of the craft." —Kirkus Reviews, starred review
★ "A master poet breathes life and color into this portrait of a historically significant sculptor and her remarkable story." —School Library Journal, starred review
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
In a rich biography in verse, Nelson (A Is for Oboe) gives voice to the Black sculptor Augusta Savage (1892–1962), a key Harlem Renaissance figure. Written primarily in the first person, moving poems convey Savage's artistic "hunger/ to pull something out of yourself" while tracing her Florida childhood as the seventh of 14 children ("beaten for making art"), her three marriages, her endeavors to make a living as an artist in New York and Europe, and her final quiet years in a Catskills town. Graceful descriptions of sculptures such as Gamin—"looks with a bemused, level/ gaze/ at the ridiculous/ and cruel stupidity/ this world abounds in/ his lips half curved, knowingly"—pay homage to her work, while concrete poems, including "The Figure of a Frog," describe art as representation ("A figure of a frog is not a frog"). The appearance of several Black historical figures ground the poems in their era; photographs of Savage's sculptures serve as a useful introduction to the artist's art and legacy. Back matter includes a straightforward biographical afterword by Tammi Lawson, curator of the NYPL's Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture. Ages 14–up. ■
