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Wrecking Crew

ca. 1940
Not on view
The first African-American artist to graduate from the Cleveland School of Art (now Cleveland Institute of Art), Sallee worked as a printmaker and, during the Depression, a muralist for the Works Progress Administration. He was the leader of the Karamu Group of printmakers, formed by artists connected to the Karamu House, an African-American theater and community center that premiered many of Langston Hughes’s plays. In his prints, Sallee frequently depicted scenes of urban labor and the Black experience in northern cities. Here, workers cart bricks and other debris out of a building in the process of being demolished.

Artwork Details

Object Information
  • Title: Wrecking Crew
  • Artist: Charles L. Sallee, Jr. (American, Oberlin, Ohio 1913–2006 Cleveland, Ohio)
  • Date: ca. 1940
  • Medium: Soft-ground etching
  • Dimensions: 9 1/16 × 12 1/16 in. (23 × 30.6 cm)
  • Classification: Prints
  • Credit Line: Gift of Reba and Dave Williams, 1999
  • Object Number: 1999.529.140
  • Curatorial Department: Modern and Contemporary Art

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Cabaret Scene, Charles L. Sallee, Jr. American, Soft-ground etching
Cabaret Scene
Charles L. Sallee, Jr.
WPA
1936–41
By Request, Charles L. Sallee, Jr. American, Etching
By Request
Charles L. Sallee, Jr.
WPA
1936–41
Jumpin Jive, Charles L. Sallee, Jr. American, Etching
Jumpin Jive
Charles L. Sallee, Jr.
ca. 1941
Almeda, Charles L. Sallee, Jr. American, Etching and aquatint
Almeda
Charles L. Sallee, Jr.
ca. 1935–43
AIDSGATE, Silence = Death Project American, Color lithograph
AIDSGATE
Silence = Death Project
1987

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