Plate from Letter from Birmingham City Jail
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View on museum website →Medium
screenprint from an illustrated book with eight screenprints
Dimensions
overall (closed): 39.8 × 33.2 × 4.9 cm (15 11/16 × 13 1/16 × 1 15/16 in.)
Classification
Volume
Department
CG-W
Museum
National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.
Credit
Gift of Ruth Fine in honor of Michele Wallace
Accession Number
2021.80.27.6
Art Historical Context
Faith Ringgold's *Plate from Letter from Birmingham Jail* (2007) is a screenprint from an illustrated featuring eight such prints, honoring Martin Luther King Jr.' seminal 1963 letter. Written while imprisoned for leading nonviolent protests against segregation in Birmingham, Alabama King's essay defends civil disobedience and the moral urgency of ending racial injustice, famously declaring, "Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere." Ringgold, a pioneering African American artist known for her narrative quilts and bold depictions of Black life, transforms this historic text into v...