only you and i (Part 1 and Part 2 - Diptych)

Corita Kent, also known as Sister Mary Corita, occupies a unique position within the field of American post-war art. Not only a woman but also a nun, educator, artist and social activist she used her art to question contemporary society, with all its flaws, actively supporting the civil rights movement and other causes related to gender, race and, overall, social justice. Kent’s work, particularly her celebrated serigraphs from the 1960s, incorporated slogans and imagery from marketing and popular culture, alongside texts addressing pressing issues of racial injustice, poverty and the Vietnam War. Katie Laird writes:

Her pop art, characterized by bold colors and abstract designs, mirrored the tumultuous era of the 1960s and 70s. She repurposed advertising slogans and biblical verses to comment on issues of poverty, racism and war. Her work, although deeply rooted in her faith, transcended the boundaries of religion, speaking to a universal audience about love, hope and justice. […] For Sister Corita, printmaking was a powerful tool for communicating with the world and connecting with those around her regardless of color, economic status or creed. […] Sister Corita’s art was not just a means of expression, but a powerful vehicle for advocating social change. She was an ‘Artivist’ - an artist and an activist, using her work as a platform to voice her concerns and inspire change.

The civil rights movement was a social movement in the United States from 1954 to 1968 which aimed to abolish legalized racial segregation, discrimination, and disenfranchisement in the country, which most commonly affected African Americans. The movement had origins in the Reconstruction era in the late 19th century, and modern roots in the 1940s. After years of nonviolent protests and civil disobedience campaigns, the civil rights movement achieved many of its legislative goals in the 1960s, during which it secured new protections in federal law for the civil rights of of all Americans.

For Kent, the civil rights movement’s demands for justice and equality were, basically, a natural extension of the message of love she herself knew from the Bible, and her art was never separate from her social activism; rather, it was an extension of it.

In 1965, she created a powerful serigraph titled my people in response to the Watts Riots (sometimes referred to as the Watts Rebellion or Watts Uprising) which took place in the Watts neighborhood and its surrounding areas of Los Angeles from August 11 to 16, 1965. The riots were motivated by anger at the racist and abusive practices of the Los Angeles Police Department, as well as grievances over employment discrimination, residential segregation, and poverty in Los Angeles. The work showcased an excerpt from Langston Hughes’ (1901 – 1967, American poet, social activist, novelist, playwright, and columnist from Missouri. An early innovator of jazz poetry, Hughes is best known as a leader of the Harlem Renaissance) poem Let America Be America Again, underscoring the importance of hope and unity during turbulent times.

Kent, like much of the nation (and the international community), was deeply shaken by the assassination of civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr. (1929 – 1968, American Baptist minister who advanced civil rights for people of colour in the United States through the use of nonviolent resistance and nonviolent civil disobedience against Jim Crow laws and other forms of legalized discrimination), on April 4, 1968. In king’s dream, she employed the patriotic national colours of red, white and blue combined with the lettering style of 19th century circus posters or ‘Wild West’ handbills, thereby contrasting King’s uplifting words with America’s history of violence.

The diptych only you and i from 1969 belongs to the famous series Heroes and Sheroes, a suite of 29 prints created between 1968 and 1969 that Kent identified as ‘a set of heroes and sheroes.’ These works, relating to the civil rights movement, manifests a key turning point in Kent’s artistic output. While Kent never directly participated in the radical activities associated with many of her contemporaries of the religious left, her heroes and sheroes works explicitly reflect the social and political movements of the decade, addressing topics such as labor and civil rights, nuclear disarmament, and political assassinations while also incorporating imagery taken directly from mass media. Notable figures represented in this series include the aforementioned Martin Luther King Jr. and Robert F. Kennedy (1925 – 1968, American politician and lawyer who served as the 64th United States attorney general, 1961 - 1964, and U.S. senator, 1965 - 1968. Like his brother John F. Kennedy, he was a prominent member of the Democratic Party and is considered an icon of modern American liberalism).

only you and i , like most of her work from the 1960s, combines literary quotes with vibrant colors, bold typography and abstract imagery; creating a unique style that continues to inspire and resonate with viewers today. In this particular case, it is a predominantly strong red colour combined with a typography that seems to be taken from old Wild West posters. To this, Kent has added a handwritten text with a concluding reference to the French existentialist Albert Camus. A closer look, however, reveals that the text has nothing whatsoever to do with Camus, it is in fact, actually, a quote from American singer, songwriter, musician and activist Joan Baez (born 1941), whose contemporary folk music often includes songs of protest and social justice: ‘Only you and I can help the sun rise each morning. If we don’t, it may drench itself out in sorrow.’ The second half of Baez’s quote (which was left out by Kent) reads as follows: ‘You special, miraculous, unrepeatable, fragile, fearful, tender, lost, sparkling ruby emerald jewel, rainbow splendor person. It’s up to you.’

When read as a whole, the quote makes it abundantly clear that Kent is stressing the fact that it is up to each and everyone of us to build a better world.

Literature

These works are identified in the Corita Kent Archive as numbers 69-82 and 69-83.

(Eds.) Ian Berry & Michael Duncan, Someday is Now: The Art of Corita Kent, 2013, p. 198 and 229.

Miscellaneous

Transcribed text:

THE MOMENT IN WHICH LIGHT COMES IS GOD only you and i can help the sun rise each morning, if we don’t it may drench itself out in sorrow.

Camus

Copyright Firestorm Foundation