Phillis Wheatley-Peters (1753-1784) African Poet in America, by Kerry James Marshall

Written by Heather Becker
Researched and edited by Carissa Tonner

For many years, the team at The Conservation Center has enjoyed working on many compelling projects for the American artist Kerry James Marshall. Our team appreciates his personal visits and collaborations because they lead to complex discussions about artistic processes, tools, concentration, ethics, and more. For EXPO CHICAGO 2023, I asked Kerry if there was anything he would like us to treat and frame that we might share in our educational booth this year, and Kerry said he would drop something by.

It is impactful for the conservators at our lab to interact with a contemporary artist such as Kerry because we know he understands all the years of training and mastery that goes into what conservators focus on behind the scenes every day of their careers. Kerry uniquely relates to them compared to most visitors. He knows the great depths of what it means to slowly and methodically work toward a goal while staying wholly concentrated on the process. For both Kerry and the team at The Conservation Center, that alert intention, focused on the moment, is what creates perfection.

So when Kerry dropped off his recent large-scale pen and ink drawing of Phillis Wheatley-Peters, it stopped us all in our tracks. Phillis Wheatley-Peters was a poet who lived from 1753-1784, whose book of poems, Poems on Various Subjects, Religious and Moral, was published in 1773. An enslaved woman born in West Africa, Wheatley-Peters, was kidnapped around the age of seven and forcibly brought to America on a slave ship named The Phillis. In Boston, Massachusetts, she was sold into enslavement to the Wheatley family. Wheatley-Peters learned to read and write and had a talent for poetry and is considered the first African author to publish a book in English. The only known image of Wheatley-Peters can be found in her book, a frontispiece attributed to her contemporary, Scipio Moorhead.

*Phillis Wheatley,* attributed to Scipio Moorehead

Scipio Moorhead was also an enslaved person whose life's details were poorly documented. While none of his original artwork is known to exist still, he is mainly known for the image of Wheatley-Peters, and for being referenced in a dedication found in her book of poems. This small engraving was referenced heavily by Kerry while creating his drawing, Phillis Wheatley-Peters (1753-1784) African Poet in America. But this is not the first work of Kerry’s to include Phillis Wheatley-Peters. His painting, Scipio Moorhead, Portrait of Himself, 1776 (2007), is an imagined self-portrait of Moorhead, and included in the background of Moorhead's studio is a work in progress - a front-facing portrait of Wheatley-Peters.

*Scipio Moorhead, Portrait of Himself, 1776 (2007)* by Kerry James Marshall (Image courtesy of Paul and Dedrea Gray)

A mesmerizing cross-hatched piece, the imagery of Phillis Wheatley-Peters (1753-1784) African Poet in America, deliberately speaks to Moorhead's work; the etching style, the clothing, and the subject sitting at a writing table, quill in hand, poised to begin writing. But here in Kerry's drawing, we see Wheatley-Peters has aged. She is looking directly at the viewer. On the table is a book, but this time, it is a copy of her first published book of poems. And on the paper in front of her, she is working out the title of the second book that was ultimately never published due to Wheatley-Peters' untimely and young death. Through this drawing, Kerry imagines what could have been the frontispiece in what would have been that upcoming second book of poems.

Another significant difference is the inscription. Here, Kerry deliberately used Phillis Wheatley-Peters to identify the subject - her married name - to show the progression of her life. As opposed to the inscription in Moorhead’s version that identifies Wheatley in relation to her servitude to the Wheatley family, Kerry instead identifies Wheatley as an “African Poet in America,” emphasizing her profession and accomplishment. Kerry wanted to showcase her as more than an emblem and allow her to mature. When telling our team about this work, Kerry talked about another piece of his, "Still Life with Wedding Portrait" (2015). An imagined wedding portrait of Harriett Tubman and her husband, John Tubman. Kerry told the team that he wanted to encapsulate Harriet Tubman's life beyond how she has been iconized and instead accentuate the "fullness of her womanhood."

*Still Life with Wedding Portrait (2015)* by Kerry James Marshall. (Photo Lenny Gilmore © MCA Chicago)

For Phillis Wheatley-Peters (1753-1784) African Poet in America, our challenge was to prepare the piece for framing by cleaning the surface and stabilizing the oval edges, which included the inscription. It posed some challenges, but overall this was a simple treatment compared to many of our previous projects with Kerry.

Katrina Flores, Associate Conservator of Works on Paper, surface cleaned the verso with eraser crumbs. The recto was selectively surface cleaned with a textile sponge and an eraser for the areas without any media. Katrina also locally cleaned the area with media using a soft brush. Katrina shared that "the lifting of the banner at the lower edge was locally burnished with a bone folder through Reemay to flatten, then placed under weight with blotters. Once treatment was complete, the piece was weighted overall between blotters while waiting to be framed."

Framing options and preferences were presented, and Kerry decided on black linen with a thick build-up around the oval image to give it depth and create a three-dimensional element. Scott Dietrich, Senior Conservation Framer, and Suz Evans, Associate Conservation Framer, housed the drawing in a linen-wrapped 8ply oval mat raised to create a shallow shadowbox for the artwork. The piece was framed with Optium Museum Acrylic in a classic black profile. The result is that the white oval image with linear mark-making becomes more pronounced against the black mat and frame.

We, as a team, kept talking about the piece as it was being worked on, and this prompted me to ask for a call with Kerry to document the process and meaning of this piece since it was the first time it was going to be shown. "I made it in 2022, during COVID, and you will be showing it for the first time," Kerry commented, "This piece was made over many months, and I kept going back to it a few hours at a time because it was so intense being pen and ink, there was no margin for error. I would need to step away because of the intensity of the work I was doing, and you cannot work with fatigue on a piece like this. It was important to come back to it every day to maintain the rhythm and the connection to the work."

When I mentioned being enveloped by the marksmanship, the more I looked at it, I said to Kerry that it seemed to have been a meditative process for him. Kerry responded promptly, "Yes, meditative is a perfect term for the slow process required with this piece; building the tones and depth using the repetition of lines was exacting. There's an important continuity to maintain from one mark to the next, placing dots between dots and lines between lines." This prompted me to mention how three-dimensional the hands were in particular; Kerry shared, "I actually created a tool to use in the process to create multiple lines at a time by taking a width of PVC board, sharpening it to a point like a pen. This would allow me to make three marks at a time and maintain consistency in the work."

Picture of PVC tools created by Kerry James Marshall for *Phillis Wheatley-Peters (1753-1784) African Poet in America*

When Kerry first dropped off this piece, I mentioned it looked like his wife, and he said, "Actually, I used her as the model." Cheryl Lynn Bruce, director, actor, and playwright, was researching Phillis Wheatley at the time for a play she will be directing at Quintessence Theatre Group in Philadelphia, "Written by Phillis," set to open on May 10th. Since there are no other known images of Wheatley-Peters than the frontispiece, Kerry thought it appropriate for Cheryl to become the model for his portrait of Philis Wheatley-Peters. Kerry worked from a photograph of Cheryl in the exact position he wanted to portray.

Throughout our conversation, the focus often shifted back to a significant topic for Kerry. The lack of depictions of this impactful African female poet - whether photographed, painted, or drawn - became a pivotal part of our discussion. Phillis Wheatley-Peters, Harriett Tubman, and Scipio Moorhead were all deprived of the significance of being depicted at the various personal development stages in their lives due to their race. When considered together, all of these works converge with meaning and exemplify why Kerry chose to execute these multi-dimensional works and their intertwined correlations. His work presents a vision of the true breadth and depth of these figures' lives.

During our conversations, Kerry mentioned how profound it was that the mature stages of these figures' lives were not documented in a way that shared their power, personal growth, and creative maturity - as unique individuals and as a record in time. This focus is an integral part of Kerry's artistic mantra. Documenting those moments in the lifetime of these pivotal black figures and sharing their excellence with the world is his inspiration and the message his work conveys to his audience.

It is with honor that we have preserved, framed, and exhibited this exceptional piece by Kerry James Marshall for the first time. Our team treasures the moments we share with Kerry and values witnessing up close how his drawing style and mark-making in Phillis Wheatley-Peters (1753-1784) African Poet in America epitomize the precious art-making process. Meanwhile, we keep preserving the masterpieces of profound artists such as Kerry so they forever remain beacons of influence and inspiration, so keep looking.