PIONEER

Legendary Artist Dies Days Before Her 100th Birthday

Betye Saar was credited with inspiring the Black women’s movement.

Groundbreaking artist Betye Saar has died days before her 100th birthday. Saar’s death in her sleep on Sunday at her home in Los Angeles was confirmed to the Los Angeles Times by her publicist Hannah Gottlieb-Graham. Saar would have turned 100 on July 30. She specialized in assemblage art, making sculpture from found objects, and her work confronted stereotypes about Black women. Her 1972 assemblage, “The Liberation of Aunt Jemima,” featured a mammy figurine– a Black woman hired to care for white children–armed with a rifle and a grenade. Three years later, Saar had a solo exhibition at the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York. Decades later, noted activist Angela Davis credited “The Liberation of Aunt Jemima” with spurring the Black women’s movement. “It’s like they abolished slavery, but they kept Black people in the kitchen as mammy jars,” Saar said in 2015. “I had this Aunt Jemima, and I wanted to put a rifle and a grenade under her skirts. I wanted to empower her. I wanted to make her a warrior. I wanted people to know that Black people wouldn’t be enslaved by that.” Her longtime gallerist Julie Roberts said Saar was “one of the greatest artists of our time.” She added, “Her singular vision transformed the course of contemporary art, and her legacy will continue to inspire generations of artists, scholars, and audiences around the world.”