Archibald Motley Jr.

Archibald Motley Jr. (1891-1981), considered one of the major contributors to the Harlem Renaissance, was a painter famous for his colorful works displaying the African American experience in the 1920s and 1930s. Unlike most Harlem Renaissance artists, Motley spent most of his life in Chicago and never lived in Harlem. His high social class gave him the opportunity to be classically trained at the Art Institute of Chicago. After receiving the Harmon Foundation award in 1928, Motley was the first African American to have a one-man exhibit in New York City, and achieved an impressive feat for an up and coming black artist by selling twenty-two of the twenty-six paintings in the exhibit. Motley won the Guggenheim Fellowship in 1929, which he had been denied from in 1927, and studied in France for a year. The works of great Renaissance artists in the Louvre inspired Motley more than looking back at Africa, which inspired most contemporary artists.

Motley's painting Blues represents the fusion of Africa and America in a popular jazz club in Paris, where the people gather to dance and listen to the newest African American music. It depicts an urban black culture that is not as popular as the images of black Southerners.

This painting embodies the Harlem Renaissance because it shows equality between everyone, despite their skin color. Since the painting is set in Paris, this painting also represents the popularity and power of the movement for it to carry that equality into foreign countries.