31 Facts About Betye Saar

Betye Irene Saar was born on July 30,1926 and is an American artist known for her work in the medium of assemblage.

Betye Saar's work is considered highly political, as she challenged negative ideas about African Americans throughout her career; Saar is best known for her artwork that critiques anti-Black racism in the United States.

Betye Saar was born Betye Irene Brown on July 30,1926, to Jefferson Maze Brown and Beatrice Lillian Parson in Los Angeles, California.

Betye Saar went on to graduate studies at California State University, Long Beach, University of Southern California, California State University, Northridge, and the American Film Institute.

Betye Saar started her adult life as a social worker and then later pursued her passion in art.

Betye Saar began her graduate education in 1958, originally working towards a career in teaching design.

Betye Saar described printmaking as her "segue from design into fine arts".

Betye Saar was inspired to create assemblages by a 1967 exhibition by found object sculptor, Joseph Cornell.

Betye Saar was greatly influenced by Simon Rodia's Watts Towers, which she witnessed being built in her childhood.

Betye Saar began to create work that consisted of found objects arranged within boxes or windows, with items that drew from various cultures to reflect her own mixed ancestry: African American, Irish, and Native American.

Betye Saar was raised by her Aunt Hattie, who influenced her identity as a Black woman.

Betye Saar described her great-aunt as a woman with dignity and poise, which impacted her depiction of the Black female body.

Betye Saar's work resisted the artistic style of primitivism, as well as the white feminist movement that refused to address issues of race.

Betye Saar's work is a result of the convergence of Black power, spirituality and mysticism, and feminism, as seen in Black Girl's Window, 1969.

Betye Saar incorporated them into collages and assemblages, transforming them into statements of political and social protest.

Betye Saar's assemblage is laid inside of a shoebox-sized frame, plastered with Aunt Jemima advertisements.

Betye Saar was supported as an artist-in-residence in Adelaide, South Australia, by the Women's Art Movement there in the 1970s or 1980s.

When her great-aunt died in 1974, Betye Saar acquired family memorabilia and created a series of more personal and intimate assemblages that incorporated nostalgic mementos of her great-aunt's life.

Betye Saar arranged old photographs, letters, lockets, dried flowers, and handkerchiefs in shrine-like boxes to suggest memory, loss, and the passage of time.

Betye Saar occasionally utilized organic materials in her work, such as bamboo, skulls, raffia, and rattan, and a few of these materials can be seen in Spirit Catcher.

Betye Saar continues to live and work in Los Angeles, working primarily in found object sculpture.

Betye Saar has been awarded honorary doctorate degrees by California College of Arts and Crafts, California Institute of the Arts, Massachusetts College of Art, Otis College of Art and Design, and San Francisco Art Institute.

Betye Saar wears a large exaggerated colored dress with a bright, checkered headpiece.

Betye Saar's skin is depicted as really Black; her eyes are large bulging out of her head.

Betye Saar's lips are large and highlighted with red color.

Betye Saar had a broom in one hand, and, on the other side, I gave her a rifle.

In "The Women's Art Journal Betye Saar: Extending the Frozen Monument", James Cristen Steward states: "Against the backdrop of pancake packaging is a grinning popped-eye 'Mammy" with a broom in one hand and a rifle in the other.

Betye Saar portrays through her art the two representations of Black women and how stereotypes portray them by defeminizing and desexualizing them and reality.

Betye Saar has stated that "the reasoning behind this decision is to empower Black women and not let the narrative of a white person determine how a Black women should view herself".

Betye Saar decided to compile such images into a film that was based on the song from the musical Hair called Colored Spade, which contains a list of derogatory terms for African Americans.

Betye Saar met with other Black women artists at Suzanne Jackson's Gallery 32 in 1970.