Etching by Percy Martin and Students

Object Details

Artist

Percy Martin

Date

late 20th Century

Medium

etching on paper

Dimensions

11 3/4 × 14 3/4 in. (29.8 × 37.5 cm)

Cite As

Anacostia Community Museum, Smithsonian Institution.

Caption

This etching, produced collaboratively by Percy Martin and his students, depicts a magical society. This is a recurring theme in Martin’s work, but its reimagining here through the eyes of children is an interesting exercise in artistic and social education. It is a task of creating an environment and thinking about how a community could exist within it. The ability to imagine a whole new world holds power and their signatures are a testament to the efforts the students put into the project.

This etching, produced collaboratively by artist Percy Martin and six other individuals (likely his students), depicts a magical society. Figures hold spears in the foreground, where an enormous fish swims in a small pond. A tent and an elephant on the horizon line are dwarfed by a soccer ball high in the air, proportional in size to Saturn and the sun. The right side of the image is covered in an abstract design featuring thin lines, jagged edges, and an enormous daisy. Thematically, the image shares commonalities with Martin’s work the Bushmen, a project that tells the story of a mythical people he imagined. Here, the intellectual exercise of envisioning a society is collaborative, evidencing how utopian dreaming and artistic creation are the first step towards realizing a better world.

Accession Number

2017.8.16

Type

print

See more items in

Anacostia Community Museum Collection

Data Source

Anacostia Community Museum

Restrictions & Rights

Usage conditions apply

Metadata Usage

Not determined

GUID

http://n2t.net/ark:/65665/dl8c0d44b89-5655-4e4c-a98a-ae2a30ced9bd

Record ID

acm_2017.8.16