To create this series, Kara Walker appropriated and enlarged select illustrations from Harper's Pictorial History of the Civil War, a two volume publication from 1866 and 1868, and overlaid them with large, black stencils. In these fifteen large-scale, lithograph silkscreen prints, Walker's signature silhouettes interrupt and transform the 19th century narratives of battle, death, and retreat.

Eloquently and provocatively placed, Walker's ghostly figures recast the positions of African Americans in United States history and craft a thought-provoking dialogue between the past and the present. With this portfolio, Kara Walker challenges the portrayals of African Americans during the antebellum period and their involvement in the war as she continues to address themes of race, gender, and sexuality in her work.

Kara Walker (1969 - )
Alabama Loyalists Greeting the Federal Gun-Boats.
2005
offset lithograph with screenprint
purchased as the gift of Katherine and Stephen C. Sherrill (PA 1971)
Addison Gallery of American Art

This exhibition has been generously funded by the Winton Family Exhibition Fund.