Art: The Ethnic Province

Abstract The depression brought an abrupt end to the vogue of Harlem. Hard times made people concentrate on the immediate, the mundane, the essentials of living, rather than on cultural concerns. The end of prohibition deprived Harlem of some of its exclusive appeal: nightlife, cabarets, illicit amusements. That could be had anywhere if one had the purse and spirit. The demise of the vogue of the Negro also ended that promoted culture called the “Harlem Renaissance.,. Self-conscious culture had to struggle for relevancy at a time when physical survival was a notable achievement. The industrial apparatus, the capitalistic system, the white man’s machine, however much despised, had never been doubted as the agent of automatic progress-the promise of American life. Economic collapse was, thus, far more shocking than could have been imagined. The intellectual dispossessed-white or black-could not avoid the mixed feelings of horror and glee that the monster was fallible after all. But the shock destroyed the easy optimism that had been assumed even among social critics. The naivete that nurtured the belief that black poets and writers, painters and sculptors, would emerge from the pages of Crisis and Opportunity or from the Harmon Foundation competitions as the new and genuine American culture seemed pathetically innocent as bread lines lengthened. It appeared that the Harlem Renaissance had been a false labor. Of course, Negro artists and writers continued under different sponsorship and promotion-sometimes by the W.P.A. and sometimes the Communist party.