Lynching in Kentucky
Datec. 1933-34
Artist
James Amos Porter
(American artist and historian, 1905–1970)
Illustration CitationUnused illustration for "Blasphemy—American Style," by Esther Popel in Opportunity, December 1934.
MediumBrush, pen, and ink on cream wove paper
Dimensionscomposition: 11 1/2 × 10 1/4 in. (29.2 × 26 cm)
sheet: 15 3/4 × 13 3/4 in. (40 × 34.9 cm)
sheet: 15 3/4 × 13 3/4 in. (40 × 34.9 cm)
Credit LineAcquisition Fund, 2021
Object number2021-20
On View
On viewCollections
ClassificationsDRAWING
Label TextThis illustration was produced to accompany a poem memorializing a horrific murder. According to the note published with it: "A Kentucky mob, at a recent lynching, helped their victim say the 'Lord's Prayer' when he seemed to have forgotten the words, after which they hanged him and burned his body." In the upper register, the artist juxtaposed the hanging, with its violent mob, at left, and the church steeple, at right. Below, he pictured an African American woman and children, perhaps the family of the lynching victim.
