Tall, overbearing, and with a look of quiet determination, a memorial depicting Martin Luther King Junior stands among many others along the National Mall in Washington D.C. The large stone sculpture looms solid and unwavering, just as King himself did as he fought for the rights of people of color in America. While the statue has faced many critiques since its unveiling in 2011, perhaps the most glaringly questionable feature is that it is white. Yes, the Martin Luther King Junior Memorial, that which commemorates a black man who fought for black rights, is indeed made entirely of white granite. The stone gives King’s skin a pale, freckled essence and has been the topic of conversation among many. Some support it, saying it caters to an artistic aesthetic, others strongly oppose it, saying that it gives the impression that King was a caucasian man (Gopnik 2011). Perhaps a look back in time, and a glimpse into the detailed history of white sculptures, may shed some light on why such a material was chosen, and why it is even more problematic than it may seem on the surface.
When one imagines a sculpture of a human figure, it is likely that ancient Greek and Roman-esque statues come to mind. What is even more likely is that people picture such statues as pure white marble, pristinely carved in the most regal and realistic manner. This imagery is no surprise, seeing as most of the artifacts people know in modern times from ancient Greece and Rome are exactly that way. Moreover, these pieces have set the precedent for art following their time, meaning sculptures created since then have also been done in this white, clean, and minimal aesthetic. Given this, there is no reason for people to think of statues looking any other way, for this is all they know. The whiteness of sculptures is well known, accepted, familiar, and considerably beautiful. But, what if the white finish of these art pieces was not actually the intended appearance at all? What if the pure and pristine aesthetic that so many find comfort and beauty in is not the intended look? It is a common misconception that art pieces looked this way when they were originally made. In reality, many sources, such as writings from Pliny and Vitruvius, indicate that the statues were originally painted, and not in the monochromatic way one might expect, but in full on, multi-color fashion (Bond 2017).
How is this information relevant to the Martin Luther King Junior memorial? Well, the artists of classic times did not only paint their sculptures, but they did so in a way that aimed to create an accurate depiction of the person the art was modeled after. This meant that their skin tone was matched to the best of the artist’s ability in order to create a proper representation (Bond 2017). (This, however, is not the case, nor did it even seem to be considered, for the Martin Luther King Junior memorial) (Gopnik 2011). Interestingly, the fact that the statues were at one time polychromatic is further covered up and kept secret by museums. Oftentimes, curators will order that any remnants of paint be scrubbed off of a sculpture so that it better fits the commonly accepted aesthetic of whiteness that so many have come to know and love (Painter 2010).
So if this is the aesthetic that people are used to now, and that many consider to be the common, artistic way of sculptures, then it shouldn’t be a problem that the Martin Luther King Junior memorial is just following the norm of perceived art traditions, right? This may seem to be the case if one does not delve further into the history of sculptures. However, if one does choose to do so, they will see that problematic racial ideas stemmed from misconceptions about ancient art pieces and have been further perpetuated, deepened, and engrained over time.
The misconception that statues were white from the start was just the beginning of what would spur many false ideas. From here, troubling notions about race, whiteness, and beauty came forth. A renowned (yet Eurocentric) art historian, Johann Winkelmann, was one of the first to promote ancient art as an ideal for beauty (Painter 2010). He asserted that Greeks and Romans were “too sophisticated” to paint their statues and that anyone who did was seen as “barbaric” (Bond 2017). Thus, these “sophisticated” pieces became the standard for great art and art was, in turn, viewed as the ideal for human appearance as well. In effect, this led to the idea of “white as beautiful”, which could be interpreted for art, but also across races throughout humanity. For example, the Greek sculptural piece Apollo Belvedere, became the ideal for what humans “should” look like in terms of beauty. This led to an unreasonable proportion of depictions of white people versus people of color through history. The trend here is consistent and visible throughout society even to this day, and many people of color have very few relatable representations of themselves or people of their race to look to (Bond 2017). Beauty ideals started with the whiteness, but then was even further studied in terms of measurements, proportions, and angles of the face as well. Such Phrenological values were associated with superiority and directly correlated to features of European races. In reaction to such ideas and concepts, it is thought that “how we color (or fail to color) classical antiquity is often a result of our own cultural values” (Bond 2017). It quickly became apparent that whiteness as a “sophisticated” and positive factor in art bled into the ideals people held for society and humanity. Skin color was soon more than a reflection of beauty and morphed into a determining factor of one’s character, personality, and broader social status as well. Of course, the white supremacist discourse that emerged offered that people of color were less desirable and had more negative traits than those with pure, uncolored skin. These ideas caught on so greatly that a kind of “science” revolved around skin color as an indicator of things such as intelligence, beauty, and, at a greater scale, societal prosperity (Painter 2010).
There is clearly a history of valuing white sculptures over colorful, painted ones, and there is also a correlated history of favoring whiteness over other races. Given this history, one has to wonder if these are the values that dictated the decisions around the Martin Luther King Junior memorial. Perhaps the idea of white equating to beauty suggested that the memorial would be more artistic if it were white. Additionally, this idea may be so ingrained in our society that it played a subconscious role in the decision. We are so constantly surrounded by white statues that it is likely people fail to think of sculptures in any other way. We have come to accept white marble as the standard for fine art and we have accepted a promoted truth that sculptural representations of people were intended to be monochromatic, pristine, and colorless. We have been told, by art historians, by museum curators, and by social values that white indicates “sophisticated”, “classy”, and “beautiful”. All of these features sound so intriguing that of course one would want a memorial that aligns with such values. This being said, it is also likely that the decision to make the statue white was, in fact, very intentional, and an effort to make a memorial that adhered to all of these perceived notions of sophisticated beauty.
However, in acknowledging and memorializing one important piece of history, another part was completely ignored. In trying to pay tribute to a black man who fought for black rights, other areas of racial history remained ignored and unrecognized. In representing a famous black man in white stone, the memorial conjures up other issues of white supremacist ideas. One cannot help but wonder if the statue was made white because they feared it being called “ugly” or “barbaric” had it been made with color. The history points to this being a strong possibility, especially seeing how any classic piece found with paint on it has the pigment quickly removed. Furthermore, by having one more white piece of art, history collects one more piece that fails to accurately represent people of color, a trend that has persisted since Winkelmann’s time. The Martin Luther King Junior memorial would have provided the ideal opportunity to finally add an accurate, colored art piece to the small collection representing people of color. This opportunity was clearly missed and has been looked upon with much disdain and debate. With such a troubled background, it is clear that there is much more behind the white facade of the Martin Luther King Junior memorial than one may initially think. While many can argue that the white is purely a problem of misleading representation, it is also a problem of a tangled, confused, and racialized history.
References
Bond, Sarah. 2017. Whitewashing Ancient Statues: Whiteness, Racism And Color In The Ancient World. Forbes. https://www.forbes.com/sites/drsarahbond/2017/04/27/whitewashing-ancient-statues-whiteness-racism-and-color-in-the-ancient-world/, accessed October 19, 2018.
The Controversial New MLK Memorial: Too White?. 2011. http://theweek.com/articles/482371/controversial-new-mlk-memorial-white, accessed October 16, 2018.
Gopnik, Blake. 2011.Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial Falls Short as Art, Works as Tribute to the Man, August 22. https://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2011/08/22/martin-luther-king-jr-memorial-falls-short-as-art-works-as-tribute-to-the-man, accessed October 16, 2018.
Painter, Nell Irvin. 2010. The History of White People. New York: W.W. Norton & Company.