A Quote by Kerry James Marshall

Black painters have done all kinds of work. It's the treatment of forms they engage in-that's what determines the value of the work, not whether you call them a black artist or not.
We're looking at a story we want to call "Am I Black enough for you?" That's that whole question of who determines what "Black enough" is. Is it color? And if it's color, then are you telling me that Clarence Thomas is Blacker than Louis Farrakhan? If it's not color then what's the line that determines whether you are?
Whether or not you call it Black Lives Matter, whether or not you put a hashtag in front of it, whether or not you call it the Movement for Black Lives, all of that is irrelevant. Because there was resistance before Black Lives Matter, and there will be resistance after Black Lives Matter.
I have this problem where it's like'I can never stop thinking. For instance, I find myself obsessing over the treatment of black women and girls by black men'the fact that black men have a special prejudice against black women and generally don't protect them or attempt to understand them, and I cry an awful lot about that.
I understand how difficult it can be for an African-American in today’s society. In fact, I can relate to black people very well indeed. My ancestors once owned slaves, and it is in my lineage to work closely with the black community. However, just because they were freed over a century ago doesn’t mean they can now be freeloaders. They need to be told to work hard, and the incentives just aren’t there for them anymore. When I’m president I plan to work closely with the black community to bring a sense of pride and work ethic back into view for them.
Here's the thing. We do a movie with a predominantly black cast, and it's put in a category of being a black film. When other movies are done with a predominantly white cast, we don't call them a white film. I'm trying to remove the stigma off things they call black films.
All work is noble; the only ignoble thing is to live without working. There is need to realize the value of work in all its forms whether manual or intellectual, to be called 'mate,' to have sympathetic understanding of all forms of activity.
There isn't only one way that black art or entertainment is represented, and that's the most important thing. We're permeating every style. We're claiming and, when necessary, appropriating all kinds of forms. Nothing is forbidden, because it's not what black people do: because it's not what we think of as black art.
I wanted to play roles which offered new ways of viewing black women and black people in general- and I have done that. And I have always, whether I needed to pay the rent or not, I've always turned down roles which I thought were stereotypical. And so when I look at my body of work in that respect, I am really happy. Because I feel my work does say something positive and that was what I always set out to do.
As a black person on the outside, because there's so much black art and so much of black people's work circulating, so many people imitating what black people do, you would think that there'd be more black people on the business side. It didn't cross my mind that every label head, for the most part, is a white guy.
If Black women stand strong and our commitment is to ending domination I know that I'm supporting Black males, Black children male and female Black elderly because the bottom line is the struggle to end domination in all its forms.
Forget reparations - we need to rescue aspects of black culture abandoned even by black folks, whether it is the blues or home cookin' or broader forms of not just survival but triumph.
Artists should be free to create what we want. I believe there's a special value in work that is a reflection of oneself as opposed to interpretation. When I see a film or a TV show about black people not written by someone who's black, it's an interpretation of that life.
Black women . . . work because their husbands can't make enough money at their jobs to keep everything going. . . . They don't go to work to find fulfillment, or adventure, or glamour and romance, like so many white women think they are doing. Black women work out of necessity.
'Smart Funny and Black' is basically a live black pop culture game show that I created. We have a live band. We have two contestants that we call 'blacksperts.' They come on stage and compete in games that I've created that test their knowledge of black culture, black history, and the black experience.
We have a lot of black Anglo-Saxons. Their skin is black, but their brain is white. When I get real mad at them, I call them 'graham crackers.'
We have a lot of black Anglo-Saxons. Their skin is black, but their brain is white. When I get real mad at them, I call them graham crackers.
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