Jessica Torres is highlighting Black artists in her art room at Pakanasink to mark Black History Month. She has a display of influential artists’ portraits and their art.

 

Each week, Ms. Torres is highlighting a new artist with a video and technique.

This week she showed second-grade students the art of Alma Thomas. They discussed why it is important to learn about all different kinds of artists.

 

Alma Thomas was born in Georgia and grew up in Washington D.C. People who knew her called her a pioneer and force of nature. Much of her artwork was inspired by nature, specifically the flowers and trees that grow throughout Washington D.C.

When she went to school, she said going into the art room was like going to Heaven. She was the very first student at Howard University’s new art program in 1921. In 1924, she became the first to graduate from Howard University with a degree in art.

She started teaching art later that year at Shaw Junior High School in Washington and continued  for 35 years, bringing the joy of art to thousands of students.

She earned a Master’s degree from Columbia University and later in life started to paint in the abstract style. Her painting technique came to be known as Alma stripes that look like mosaics. Still, they were always inspired by nature, like light through the leaves of trees.

In 2014, her painting, Resurrection, became the first piece of artwork by a Black woman in the White House permanent collection.

The students looked at the growing resource binders of Black artists to get some inspiration and started to work on their own artwork.