This installation includes original and reproduction doll art as illustrated and described.
Ballet Practice: An original acrylic on canvas painting of an aspiring young ballet dancer practicing in her bedroom for an audience of dolls and teddy bears using her mother’s broom between two chairs as a barre or handrail.
Date: A gift from the curator’s husband in 2022
Measurement: 15 x 13 (including the frame)
Artist: Don Garrett
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Floyd Bell’s Music Dolls on Canvas: A framed limited-edition portrait of Floyd Bell’s Music Dolls on canvas is numbered 4/500 and has a certificate of authenticity. The third doll from the left is Robert Raikes’ Annabelle (a friend of Hitty) given to Bell at Rowbear’s National Doll Festival in 2006. Bell deepened the wooden complexion of the Raikes’ doll and dressed it in a vintage crocheted dress.
Date: A gift from Floyd Bell to the curator in 2007
Measurements: 22 x 26 inches (including the frame)
Signed by: Floyd Bell
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Framed Doll Book Cover: An enlarged cover image of the curator’s first book, The Definitive Guide to Collecting Black Dolls, printed on canvas and framed as a gift for the curator from doll-enthusiast, Vicky Williams.
Date: 2004
Measurement: 20 x 16 inches (not including the frame)
Created by: Canvas on Demand
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Lullaby by H. Hargrove: A framed serigraph on canvas captures a child in her bedroom kneeling on an oval rug as she tucks her doll in its cradle. Her trusty dog looks on. A white ruffled Priscilla curtain tied back with a white fabric bow covers the window. A teddy bear and a miniature rocking horse sit on the window sill. The child’s bed is covered with a patchwork quilt. A framed painting of a teddy bear holding a balloon bouquet adorns the wall behind the headboard.
Date: Circa 1990s (95- is written in pencil on the back.)
Measurements: 16 x 12 inches
Artist: H. Hargrove
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The Right Choice: A black and white pencil drawing illustrates a brown-skinned young girl holding up a brown-skinned doll. The drawing was inspired by Dr. Mamie and Kenneth Clark’s late-1940s Dolls Test (a.k.a. Doll Test). In the Clarks’ test, children with complexions of varying shades of brown were given a series of instructions to choose between two dolls that, except for complexion, were identical—one doll was black and the other white. In most responses, the brown children preferred the white doll over the black doll, e.g. “Give me the doll that is a nice color.” The artist, Sonya Walker, discusses “The Right Choice” in the video above the slideshow.
Date: 1993
Measurements: 18 x 14 inches
Artist: Sonya Walker
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Washday: Giclee on canvas painting of a young girl washing and hanging her dolls’ clothes outside using a scrub board and a wash bucket as the dolls sit in chairs observing. It is certified (1935819) by Artistic Impressions, Inc. as an original canvas reproduction painting #2635.
Date: Circa 1970-1989
Measurements: 15 x 19 inches
Artist: G. Rose
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Video
Slideshow
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