People to Know

Bessie Smith - From humble beginnings, Bessie Smith emerged as one of the most renowned and recognizable singers from the Jazz Age. Bessie Smith sang for and about her audiences, with many of her songs detailing the struggles that her community faced under crude discrimination laws. Her most popular songs include, “St. Louis Blues,” “Nobody Knows You When You’re Down and Out,” and “Down Hearted Blues.” Her work went on to inspire dozens of female artists throughout the 20th century, and continues to influence popular music today.

Countee Cullen - Born in Kentucky in 1903, Countee Cullen grew up to be an accomplished poet, and a strong voice at the forefront of the Harlem Renaissance. Some of his more popular publications include, “For A Lady I Know” and “A Brown Girl Dead.” Despite his budding career as a poet, Cullen took on a brief position at Frederick Douglass Junior High School, where he served as a French teacher. This is where he would go on to meet his future student, and soon-to-be mentee, James Baldwin. He died in 1946, having published dozens of works of poetry and establishing himself as a powerful force throughout the pre-civil rights movement era.

Beauford Delaney made his mark on the world as a painter during the Harlem Renaissance. As a Modernist artist, Delaney focused much of his work on the lively scenes around him, in addition to painting the portraits of many different African American figures in the early 20th century, including the likes of W.E.B Du Bois, Duke Ellington, and James Baldwin. Although he shifted to a more abstract approach as time went on, his earlier paintings still stand today as significant contributions to the artistic work done throughout the Harlem Renaissance.

Richard Wright - Most famously known for his 1940 novel, Native Son, author Richard Wright sought to write about the African American experience and explicate what life was like for the Black community prior to the civil rights movement. Wright's work depicted life in America for Black people in a visceral and real way that had never been put on the page before. Having established himself as a strong voice within the African American community, many young Black writers used him as inspiration, including James Baldwin, Lorraine Hansberry, and Chester Himes. To this day, his writing is attributed to having helped lay the foundation for the civil rights movement.

Photograph by Carl Van Vechten Photograph by Carl Van Vechten

Beauford Delaney, 1950