Mama Can Sing: Museum Object and Cultural History

The object in the museum catalogue

A color lithograph depicting a woman singing. Outlined in blue and metallic gold against black, she wears a blue and gold striped dress and spreads her arms wide, her face tilted back, and her purple lips open in song. There are blue accent shapes behind her and, in the space between her arms and her body, the words “MAMA CAN SING.” In the margin just below the image, handwritten in graphite is the edition [AP 8/20], the title [Mama Can Sing] and the artist’s signature [Faith Ringgold 12/11/04].

Materials, dates and provenance

• Date: 2004
• Created by: Faith Ringgold, American, 1930 - 2024
• Type: screen prints
• Type: portraits
• Medium: ink on paper
• Dimensions: H x W: 28 1/2 × 22 1/4 in. (72.4 × 56.5 cm)
• Topic: African American
• Topic: Art
• Topic: Jazz (Music)
• Topic: Singers (Musicians)
• Object number: 2020.58.5
• Credit Line: Collection of the Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture, Gift of Juanita and Melvin Hardy
• Data Source: National Museum of African American History and Culture

Sources and reuse

Catalogue descriptions and facts adapted from National Museum of African American History and Culture through the Smithsonian's official Open Access dataset. This record explicitly marks its metadata CC0 1.0; formatting and selection have been changed. The underlying object's rights statement is: © Faith Ringgold 2004 Permission required for use. Proper usage is the responsibility of the user.