Your assignment asks you to conduct background research on of the images or artworks featured in Claudia Rankine's Citizen. In this sense, your primary sources are Rankine's text and the image on which you choose to anchor your analysis. Your background research may include information about the creator/artist, the specific artwork, the form or style of the piece, or any contextual or thematic elements significant to the image.
The resources on this guide will help you interpret the images in Rankine's text and identify tertiary and secondary sources for your annotated bibliography.
Before you begin analyzing your piece, consider looking for additional images of the work. Viewing a work of art in text can be limiting, because its size, scope, and details cannot be easily ascertained. Locating additional images can provide you with different angles or details to consider in your analysis. Digital images can be found through library resources like ArtStor and Oxford Art Online, via the artist's website (if available), or an open web search.
A digital library of images in the areas of art, architecture, the humanities, and social sciences, with a set of tools to view, present, and manage images.
Artstor is now available in its new home on JSTOR! When you search JSTOR, you will find Artstor’s 2+ million licensed images and more than 1,700 additional primary source collections alongside JSTOR’s vast collection of books, journal articles, and research reports.
The following questions may help you interpret your chosen image or identify components for further research.
As you view a work of art, ask yourself these questions:
For information about formal analysis, see The Art of Writing about Art and A Short Guide to Writing about Art (also ebook version available).
In your breakout rooms, consider the following images of Kara Walker's Darkytown Rebellion (2001).
