Free, White and 21, Howardena Pindell (Primary Title)

Howardena Pindell, American, born 1943 (Artist)

1980
American
Media-Based Art
DVD copy of original videotape recording (color and sound)
Overall: 4 11/16 in., 12.21 minutes (11.91 cm, 732.6 seconds)
2017.108

This is the first of Pindell’s artworks to explicitly address her experiences with racism and sexism as an African American woman and artist. In this video, Pindell plays two roles: herself and the “blond woman,” a white personae. Scenes in which she looks at the camera and recounts her encounters with prejudice are interspersed with short clips of the white woman challenging the artist’s perceived isolation and alienation, accusing her of overreacting.

Pindell wrote: “I decided to make Free, White and 21 after yet another run-in with racism in the art world and the white feminists. . . . It was about domination and the erasure of experience, cancelling and rewriting history in a way that made one group feel safe and not threatened.”

The bandages she wraps around her head during the film reference a car accident she survived in 1979. Pindell describes this near-death experience as motivation for speaking out in her work about things that matter most.

Printed in black on DVD: Free, White and 21, Howardena Pindell / TRT: 12:21
Gift of Garth Greenan and Bryan Davidson Blue
© Howardena Pindell

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