Barthélémy Toguo
Ida B. Wells (1862-1931), 2017
Brass
17.7 x 15.75 x 7.9 inches (45 x 40 x 20 cm)
Barthélémy Toguo’s powerful portrait of Ida B. Wells (1862-1931), honors the memory of one of the early leaders in the fight for African American and Civil Rights.
Ida B. Wells was born enslaved in Mississippi, a year before emancipation. Her experience of being removed from a train car based on race when she was a 25-year-old schoolteacher fueled her activism. She battled the injustice in court. Her pioneering journalism and political strategizing widely publicized inequality and challenged the erasure of Black American History.
Wells was awarded the Pulitzer Prize in May, 2020 for her “outstanding and courageous reporting on the horrific and vicious violence against African Americans during the era of lynching.” Her campaign against this brutality, of which began more than 130 years ago is immediately relevant today. – Dede Young