Growing up in the late 19th century, Laura Wheeler Waring didn’t see any artist who looked like her. She didn’t see any paintings of people who looked like her, either. As a young woman studying art in Paris, she found inspiration in the works of Matisse and Gaugin to paint the people she knew best. Back in Philadelphia, the Harmon Foundation commissioned her to paint portraits of accomplished African Americans. Her paintings still hang in Washington, D.C.’s National Portrait Gallery, where children of all races can admire the beautiful shades of brown she captured. Read by author Nancy Churnin and including a teaching guide.
Presenter: Nancy Churnin, author of Beautiful Shades of Brown
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