By African-American artist and educator Hilda Wilkinson Brown (1894-1981), Portrait of a Girl. I could find little specific information about this painting, nor could I find a better photo; however, it appears on the website for the short documentary film “Kindred Spirits: Artists Hilda Wilkinson Brown and Lilian Thomas Burwell.” The film explores the relationship between Brown and her niece, also an artist. #arthistory #BlackHistoryMonth #blackart #blackartist #womanartist
From Paul Richard, “Drawing on the District: The Neglected Art Of Hilda Wilkerson Brown,” The Washington Post, November 14, 1983:
“Like the finest works she left us, Hilda Brown herself was sophisticated, genteel, charming, modest, tough. In the '20s and the '30s, she was one of the few painters capable of linking this city's black community to the world of modern art.
Her best paintings are delightful. Her subjects are familiar. She painted what she saw here--the lights of Griffith Stadium, brick Victorian row houses, the streets of Le Droit Park. Her oils please at once, and after pleasing unfold slowly. They have quiet truths to give us. Hers are images that teach.
When it suited her intentions she would borrow from the moderns. She fully understood the space-declaring brushstrokes of Ce'zanne, Lyonel Feininger's light rays, and the sweet, domestic scale of the paintings at the Phillips. But her style is her own."
