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Racial Stereotypes in American Art
By Noelle Akemann
Throughout American history, art has reflected the racial realities of the country. The way artists chose to paint people often revealed how ideas about race shaped everyday life, sometimes clearly and sometimes more quietly. When you look at different works from the colonial era through the years after the Civil War, the stereotypes may appear to change, but their meaning stays the same.
The first painting I focused on is Portrait of Henry Darnall III by Justus Englehardt Kuhn from 1710. It shows a young white boy named Henry Darnall standing beside a young Black boy who was enslaved. Henry wears elegant clothing and stands tall with a serious expression that makes him look older and more powerful. The Black boy stands slightly behind him and wears a metal collar around his neck, which shows that he was treated as property.The difference between the two boys says everything about the world they lived in. During colonial times, these kinds of paintings were not seen as cruel but as a symbol of wealth and status. The portrait shows how openly racial hierarchy was displayed and accepted in early America.
More than a hundred years later, William Sidney Mount’s Rustic Dance after a Sleigh Ride (1830) takes a different approach. The scene looks cheerful, people are dancing, talking, and playing music in a candlelit room. However, even here, the same pattern appears. The Black figures are pushed into the background. They play instruments and smile in exaggerated ways that match the stereotypes of the time, showing Black people as happy and comical entertainers. While the painting seems joyful, it continues the idea that Black Americans existed mainly to serve or entertain white Americans. The racism is still prominent, just covered by a lively scene.
Mount’s later paintings, The Bone Player and The Banjo Player (both 1856), also show Black musicians, but this time in detailed portraits. The men are well-dressed, calm, and carefully painted, which gives them dignity. However, the titles and subjects still define them only by what they do, not who they are. Their talent becomes their identity. These portraits may look respectful, but they quietly continue the same old stereotype that Black identity revolves around performance and entertainment. Mount’s position as an artist selling his work likely influenced him to keep these stereotypes subtle but familiar.
Winslow Homer’s The Cotton Pickers (1876), painted after the Civil War, shows two Black women standing in a cotton field. They are no longer caricatures or background figures. Their faces are thoughtful and serious, and the woman in front looks out at the horizon with determination. Still, the title of the painting reduces them to their labor. Even in freedom, they are seen through the work they do. The painting captures both pride and exhaustion. It shows how the end of slavery did not erase the social and economic systems that limited Black lives.
All of these paintings show a pattern. The language of racial hierarchy shifts over time but never really disappears. Early artists like Kuhn showed it directly, while others like Mount and Homer hid it behind beauty, music, or realism. The faces, colors, and tones change, but the message stays. Art becomes a record of how racism evolved and how deeply it was built into the culture. Recognizing these patterns matters because they still shape the way we see history. When we look closely at these artworks, we can see not only their beauty but also what they say about power and inequality. Art doesn’t just show what people believed, it helps explain how those beliefs were passed down, disguised, and remembered.
Fig 1. Justus Englehardt Kuhn, Portrait of Henry Darnall III, Oil on Canvas 1710, Maryland Center for History and Culture
Fig 2. William Sidney Mount, Rustic Dance after a Sleigh RideI, Oil on Canvas 1830, Museum of Fine Arts Boston
Fig 3. William Sidney Mount, The Bone Player, Oil on Canvas 1856, Museum of Fine Arts Boston
Fig 4. William Sidney Mount, The Banjo Player, Oil on Canvas 1856, Museum of Fine Arts Boston
Fig 5. Winslow Homer, The Cotton Pickers, Oil on Canvas 1876, LACMA
Racial Stereotypes in American Art
concentration: Art History