Art
Horace Pippin: Brushing Struggles on Canvas
Pippin’s work, according to some scholars, depicted the Black experience in America “without an assumption of inferiority or attitudes of protest or satire acquired in defense … but simply and literally from what was inside his head.”
Horace knew that he could never have afforded such supplies on his own. He used them to continue as a self-taught artist and later, a painter. Unbeknownst to everyone at the time, the West Chester, Pa.–born artist would later use his talent to heal many of his personal struggles: poverty, racism, and fighting in World War I. But first, he would meet life’s hurdles.
At around age 15, Pippin’s stepfather left the family. He then had to leave the segregated school he attended in Goshen, N.Y., and take on a series of odd jobs to help support his family.
While working at a nearby farm, he’d sketched a drawing of his employer taking a nap. The employer was so impressed that he offered to pay to send Pippin to art school. By then though, Pippin’s mother had taken ill. He was her sole support and had to turn the offer down.
Young Pippin also worked as a porter at the St. Elmo Hotel in Goshen, which served well-to-do guests. To Pippin, listening to their conversations and learning about their life experiences was intriguing. One guest was former president Ulysses S. Grant. The stories about Grant and Abraham Lincoln stuck with Pippin. He captured the tales in his mind—they would appear in his later paintings.
Pippin was a young man of 23 when his mother died. At that time, he relocated to Patterson, N.J., where he worked for a moving company, packing and crating high-end furniture and paintings owned by well-to-do families. This experience exposed him to genres of art he never would have seen otherwise.
Pippin’s exhibition career began in 1937. Galleries showcased themes including landscapes, portraits, biblical subjects, and scenes from his service in World War I. When Pippin’s regiment came under fire, he’d quickly sketch his front-line peers and their surroundings. These would later become his early war paintings. His best-known works address slavery and racial segregation. Collectively, they tell the story of a battle against racism.
His first oil painting, “The Ending of the War, Starting Home,” depicts a military engagement resembling the assault on Sechault, where Pippin was wounded and his regiment decimated. His works reflected scenes from the war several times thereafter in the 1930s and once more in 1945.
Pippin’s work, according to some scholars, depicted the Black experience in America “without an assumption of inferiority or attitudes of protest or satire acquired in defense … but simply and literally from what was inside his head.”
Pippin garnered fame both nationally and internationally. His life and his expressive power, composition and form in his art are an authentic expression of the American spirit.
