Betye Saar made prints for a decade before moving into her signature technique of assemblage. “I was never a pure printmaker,” she admits. “I fooled around with all kinds of techniques.” It was Black Girl’s Window—a silhouetted self-portrait bearing cosmological signs—that marked her shift from print to sculpture. With that shift came Saar’s distinctive themes of space, mysticism, and, most importantly, what it means to be female and African-American in the U.S. —E.C.

Betye Saar: The Legends of Black Girl’s Window
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Museum of Modern Art / New York / Art
Museum of Modern Art / New York / Art
Betye Saar, “Black Girl’s Window,” 1969 © 2019 Betye Saar, courtesy the artist and Roberts Projects, Los Angeles. Digital Image © 2018 The Museum of Modern Art, New York. Photo: Rob Gerhardt.
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