Month: February 2017

Lush

On By dancingpalmtreesIn 13 Crazy Things White People Think About Black Hair, Lush, The Daily Post, Uncategorized7 Comments

 

https://dailypost.wordpress.com/prompts/lush/#like-252376

DAILY PROMPT

Lush

When I was younger my hair was Lush, Full, Thick and so Dense that if my Mom used a regular comb the teeth in the comb would break. In the 1970s my hair was proudly Afrocentric. Watu Wasuri Use Afro Sheen. Some of you may remember that commercial. Of course like most Black Women I’ve worn my hair in many other styles including straightened using both the straightening comb and chemical process, the 1980s Jheri Curl, Locs, box braids, cornrows, Bantu knots, etc… When I had my Locs they reached all the way down my back to my butt. Loved it but after a while this hairstyle proved to be high maintenance so back I went to the Afro.

However since Menopause I’ve experienced certain unwanted changes in my hair. It is still fairly thick but not as dense and the texture has become more wiry with a change in the curl pattern.  It is also more wild than when I was younger as though the hair had a life of it’s own. Well maybe it does.

The worst hair change was having my hair literary go gray overnight when I was 52. I Don’t Like Gray Hair and I Do NOT want to own it like some white lady visitor to the museum told me I needed to do. I enjoy coloring my hair Vampire Red and I know and believe I look Great with Red Hair. I get lots of compliments on my hair.  This brings me to the below video and yes I’ve had white people both male and female say these things to me at work and attempt to touch my hair.

Let’s get this straight. Never. Ever. Upon the possibility of getting slapped or punched in the face should you touch or attempt to touch a Black person’s Hair. Touching hair is intimate contact which most Black people myself include Do Not Appreciate. STOP!! No Touching! Black People are not petting zoos and I for one HATE to be Touched. If I don’t know you and you don’t know me KEEP Your Distance!! Exclusions are small children, developmentally disabled kids who have come up to me and hugged me. the very elderly and disabled people who need assistance.  These groups are okay. As for the rest of you well I can only conclude that you must but some type of pervert or sex predator.

Again: DON’T TOUCH MY HAIR OR ANY PART OF MY PERSON!!

 

After you watch the videos I’ve included a Slide Show of my hair over the years.

 

Things Not To Say To Someone With Afro Hair

 

13 Crazy Things White People Think About Black Hair

 

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

 

 

Happy 87th Birthday in Heaven Dad

On By dancingpalmtreesIn Edward G. Palmer, Edward Gordon Palmer, Edward Palmer, Uncategorized25 Comments

 

 

Happy 87th Birthday in Heaven Daddy!!

Feb. 11, 1930 to May 13, 1995

A Husband, Father, Korean War Air-force Veteran, Protector and Provider. 

Stephen and I are who we are because of you!!  Miss you and Love you!!

Love, DeBorah and Stephen

Mom & Dad
My Dad Edward G. Palmer
My Dad Edward G. Palmer
Me and Dad
Our Florida vacation around 1986
Stephen, Me & Daddy 1977
The King had found his Queen and for 40 years they reigned together.
Dad’s 1st car early 1950s. DeBorah Ann Palmer

 

 

 

 

Jacob Lawrence

On By dancingpalmtreesIn Artist, Harlem, Harlem Renaissance, The African Americans Many Rivers to Cross Episode 4- Making a way Out of no way 1897 1940, Uncategorized

 

Jacob Lawrence

http://www.jacobandgwenlawrence.org/

http://www.biography.com/people/jacob-lawrence-9375562

Jacob Lawrence Biography

Academic, Painter (1917–2000)
Jacob Lawrence was an American painter, and the most widely acclaimed African-American artist of the 20th century. He is best known for his Migration Series.

Synopsis

Born in New Jersey but raised in New York City’s Harlem, Jacob Lawrence was the most widely acclaimed African-American artist of the 20th century. Known for producing narrative collections like the Migration Series and War Series, he brought the African-American experience to life using blacks and browns juxtaposed with vivid colors. He also taught, and spent 15 years as a professor at the University of Washington.

Early Life and Career

Born in Atlantic City, New Jersey, on September 7, 1917, Jacob Lawrence moved with his parents to Easton, Pennsylvania, at the age of 2. When his parents separated in 1924, his mother deposited him and his two younger siblings in foster care in Philadelphia, and went to work in New York City. When he was 13, Lawrence joined his mother in Harlem.

Lawrence was introduced to art shortly after his arrival, when his mother enrolled him in Utopia Children’s Center, which had an after-school art program. He dropped out of school at 16 but took classes at the Harlem Art Workshop with Charles Alston and frequently visited the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

In 1937, Lawrence won a scholarship to the American Artists School in New York. When he graduated in 1939, he received funding from the Works Progress Administration Federal Art Project. He had already developed his own style of modernism, and began creating narrative series, painting 30 or more paintings on one subject. He completed his best-known series, Migration of the Negro or simply The Migration Series, in 1941. The series was exhibited at Edith Halpert’s Downtown Gallery in 1942, making Lawrence the first African-American to join the gallery.

 

World War II and After

At the outbreak of World War II, Lawrence was drafted into the United States Coast Guard. After being briefly stationed in Florida and Massachusetts, he was assigned to be the Coast Guard artist aboard a troopship, documenting the experience of war around the world. He produced 48 paintings during this time, all of which have been lost.

When his tour of duty ended, Lawrence received a Guggenheim Fellowship and painted his War Series. He was also invited by Josef Albers to teach the summer session at Black Mountain College in North Carolina. Albers reportedly hired a private train car to transport Lawrence and his wife to the college so they wouldn’t be forced to transfer to the “colored” car when the train crossed the Mason-Dixon Line.

Back in New York after his stint in the south, Lawrence continued to paint. He grew depressed, however, and in 1949, he checked himself into Hillside Hospital in Queens, where he stayed for 11 months. He painted as an inpatient, and the work created during this time differs significantly from his other work, with subdued colors and people who appear resigned or in agony.

After leaving Hillside, Lawrence turned his attention to the theater. In 1951, he painted works based on memories of performances at the Apollo Theater in Harlem. He also began teaching again, first at Pratt Institute and later the New School for Social Research and the Art Students League.

Teaching and Commissions

In 1971, Lawrence accepted a tenured position as a professor at University of Washington in Seattle, where he taught until he retired in 1986. In addition to teaching, he spent much of the rest of his life painting commissions, producing limited-edition prints to help fund nonprofits like the NAACP Legal Defense Fund, the Children’s Defense Fund and the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture. He also painted murals for the Harold Washington Center in Chicago, the University of Washington and Howard University, as well as a 72-foot mural for New York City’s Times Square subway station.

Lawrence painted until a few weeks before he died, on June 9, 2000.

Personal Life

Lawrence married Gwendolyn Knight, a sculptor and painter, in 1941. She actively supported his work, providing both assistance and criticism, and helped him compose captions for many of his series.

 

http://www.jacobandgwenlawrence.org/

Hear the Artist in his own words.

Jacob Lawrence

 

 

The African Americans Many Rivers to Cross Episode 4- Making a way Out of no way 1897 1940

https://youtu.be/JIOH8QvaLSQ

Why America Needs Black History Month

On By dancingpalmtreesIn Black History Month, History Brief: The Great Migration, Jacob Lawrence, The Migration Series, 1940-41 (*long version*), Jacob Lawrence: The Migration Series, Uncategorized8 Comments

 

Black History has not been incorporated or included into most American school curriculum. Recently I have spoke with a young white co-worker who is from my Mom’s Hometown of Dayton, Ohio and came of age in the 1990s. Let’s say he is in his mid to late 20s a well educated young man who admitted to me that he had never heard of many of the Black Artists, Scientists, Inventors, Photographers, Painters, Sculptors, Writers etc… that I know and admire.

Many white young people especially those raised in the Mid-West or the South, ie the “Bible Belt” do not know or have even heard about Blacks who built America. Says a lot about the American “Mis-education system” which excludes entire races and populations because they don’t fit into our lopsided concept of America.

Also one of the younger white assistant curators at my museum workplace who recently curated a Block Buster exhibit of a living African-American artist had to admit that he never knew or learned about the Great Migration until he curated the special exhibit. That’s sad.  So in the U.S.A. you’re not really receiving an education so much as an indoctrination into all things white. White is seen as worthy whereas Black and Native American cultures and contributions are rarely acknowledged.

Black History is American History!!

Here is some more information about the Great Migration and artist Jacob Lawrence who chronicled this important passage of American History.  I have had the opportunity to see this collection at MoMA twice.

Jacob Lawrence, The Migration Series, 1940-41 (*long version*)

 

Jacob Lawrence: The Migration Series

 

History Brief: The Great Migration

 

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Sister Friend Gratitude Prayer

On By dancingpalmtreesIn Uncategorized16 Comments

Sent this prayer praise message out to both my Close Sister Friend. One is Muslim. The other Buddhist. Both Outstanding, kind, compassionate, honest, hard working, caring, wonderful ladies. 

I Love them both. 

Here’s the Prayer of Thanksgiving! 

Father God I Thank you in Jesus name for my precious Sister Friend. Not only is she Blessed but she is also a Blessing to every life she touches especially mine.

I remain forever grateful that you caused our paths to cross. I am a Better Woman because of my Sister Friend wisdom, knowledge, kindness, compassion and understanding. She is an Angel in my life. 

Thank you!