Ethiopia Awakening
Item
Title
Ethiopia Awakening
Date
1921
Medium
Plaster, Paint
Dimensions
13.9 x 3.5 x 3.25 in.
Accession Number
2006.331
On View
Danforth Art Museum at Framingham State University Fuller Gallery 204 (Large Pedestal, )
Classification
The Danforth calls this a maquette but probably made after the commission.
Description
Upright female figure wearing blue headdress, short-sleeved top. Lower body is wrapped as a mummy would be. Figure's left arm is at side, with hand extended. Right hand holds end of mummy wrappings against figure's chest.
Accrual Method
Exhibition History: Danforth's "Meta Vaux Warrick Fuller Special Collection Re-installation", March 2016 Danforth Art at Worcester Art Museum, October 2016 - December 2017 Collection was gifted to the Danforth in 2006. Unfortunately they sat uncatalogued for close to 10 years. It took until an IMLS grant awarded in 2015 through 2016 for this collection to be catalogued and put into the collections database. - Rachel 2021 Alternate Titles: Awakening Ethiopia; Ethiopia NY was to host America's Making festival (Making of America exposition). The Negro Commission Chairman James W. Johnson contacted Meta asking how much would it be to make a sculpture. Metal already had an idea for a sculpture with a symbol of Ethiopia as an Egyptian Mummy unwrapping herself. Stated she would make a 12" model for about $160 and another $100 for her labor. Appendix states made bewtween 1915 and 1921, so possibly working on sketches before commission asked. One piece is mentioned for a 1922 memorial exhibition for Mary Baldwin at the Boston Public Library. Several copies exist. New York Public Library has 5' tall bronze and a bronze maquette from the Shomburg Collection. Warde and Chrislan appear to have two bronze and one buff maquette. Smithsonian Museum of African American History has bronze maquette donated by a family member. Danforth has painted maquette. From family inventory they note Maya Angelou had a replica. From Kerr's thesis noted a bronze reproduction owned by the James Weldon Johnson Collection in the Beineke Library at Yale University
Provenance
Gift of the Meta V. W. Fuller Trust Part of the Estate of Meta V. W. Fuller from 1968-2001. In the collection of the Meta V. W. Fuller Trust, 2001-2006
Condition
Good: Some paint loss along outer edges of headdress, visible from back.
Credit
Gift of the Meta V. W. Fuller Trust