Many Thousand Gone

1980

Aminah Robinson

(American, 1940–2015)

Culture

America

Medium

watercolor and ink on paper

Measurements

Sheet: 36.6 x 53 cm (14 7/16 x 20 7/8 in.); Mount: 49.4 x 66 cm (19 7/16 x 26 in.)

Credit Line

Gift of Barbara Tannenbaum and Mark Soppeland 2024.155

This artwork is known to be under copyright.

Location

Not on view

Did You Know?

In addition to her drawings, Aminah Robinson was an accomplished and prolific quilter.

Description

This drawing exemplifies the practice of Aminah Robinson, a Columbus-based artist whose work reflected the stories and traditions of Black culture. As a child, Robinson’s father taught her to sketch and to make books from homemade paper—such as the sheet used for this work. Black figures blend together into a singular mass that is juxtaposed by a crowd wearing the white hoods of Ku Klux Klan members at lower right. A meditation on African American history, the work is titled for a spiritual sung by enslaved Black Americans that concludes with the verse “No more slavery chains for me / Many thousand gone.”