Hope For Tomorrow: Black-Native Relationalities In The Murals Of John T. Biggers

John T. Biggers is renowned for his visual representations of African and African American cultures in monumental murals. His artwork reflects his education at Hampton University, Virginia where he was taught the power of racial and cultural self- determination through art. This pedagogy was practiced throughout his career in Houston, Texas as an arts educator and professional artist. Three murals—House of the Turtle (1990-1992), Tree House (1990-1992), and Salt Marsh (1996-1997)—were among Biggers’s last commissioned projects. These works have been overlooked in scholarship yet stand apart from his other works for their distinct Native American representations. I critically analyze the Indigenous presence in these murals to expand the current interpretations of Biggers’s artistic legacy. I interpret these murals with Indigenous representations as sites of Black-Native relationalities, which illuminate the complex and entangled histories of Black and Native Americans with each other. I position these representations the specific colonial, racial, institutional, and land-based contexts of Hampton, Virginia and Houston, Texas.

Name thesis:degree_name

Master of Arts

Discipline thesis:degree_discipline

Art History

Grantor

University of Houston

Year dc:date.issued

2025

Author dc:creator

• Young, Allison Victoria 2001-

Advisor dc:contributor.advisor

• Harren, Natilee

Committee members dc:contributor.committeemember

• Koontz, Rex
• Zalman, Sandra

• Art--History

Language dc:language.iso

English

Handle dc:identifier.uri

https://hdl.handle.net/10657/19533

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:uh-ir.tdl.org:10657/19533