With These Hands
Artist
Luther E. Vann
(American, 1937 - 2016)
Date1994
MediumAcrylic on canvas
DimensionsFramed: 28 × 45 1/4 inches (71.1 × 114.9 cm)
Credit LineMuseum purchase.
Object number2000.5.1
On View
Not on view
Copyright© Luther E. Vann.
The images and text contained on this page are owned by Telfair Museums or used by the Museum with permission from the owners. Unauthorized reproduction, transmission or display of these materials is prohibited with the exception of items deemed “fair use” as defined by U.S. and international copyright laws.Label TextBorn in Savannah, Luther Vann moved to New York in the 1940s with his parents, who, like many African American Americans, were seeking a better life in the north in the second phase of the Great Migration. Vann returned home during summers to live with his aunt and uncle in Savannah until the age of eighteen. As a youth in New York, Vann had the opportunity to take Saturday art classes at a community center taught by Charles Alston, a noted painter of the Harlem Renaissance. Vann continued to study art in New York at the High School for Art and Music, The Art Students League and the New School for Social Research. He sold his first painting at Spiral Gallery in a show co-juried by Romare Bearden, and later made prints at Bob Blackburn’s Printmaking Workshop. Vann is also part of a migration back to the South. Returning to Savannah in the 1980s to take care of his aunt, he began a process of rediscovery, making art reflecting the local community.