The Darktown Opera--The Lovers Leap: "Whar yer gwine to, dis ain't in de book."

The late nineteenth-century Darktown prints by Currier & Ives depict racist stereotypes that are offensive and disturbing. The Metropolitan Museum of Art preserves such works to shed light on their historical context and to enable the study and evaluation of racism.

This print caricatures Black (African American) people at a catastrophic opera performance. On stage (at center), the actress (wearing a blue blouse, white skirt with red polka dots, white knickers and holey pink socks) has fallen out of her window setting (at right) onto a costumed young man (wearing a yellow hat with a long red plume), who has fallen backwards to the floor. Two alarmed stagehands are in the back of the stage (one in front of the stone wall, the other with arms upraised behind the wall). Chaos and confusion reigns over the orchestra in the pit (in the foreground) and audience members in wooden boxes at right and left. At the lower left, the open-mouthed bass player has lifted his bow above his instrument; at the lower right, a drummer cowers away from his drum, while the conductor (the patched seat of his pants now visible) raises his arms in shock. Three other orchestra members are visible. Dangling from an upper level box at right, a man hangs on anxiously, while another man in the box below gestures to come to his aid. In a box at left, a banjo has hit the left cheek of a surprised woman wearing a pink dress; she holds her telescope in her upraised right hand. Her male companion turns to flee the commotion. In the box above, an elderly man looks at the scene in amazement. The title and the caption (words spoken by the fallen actor) are imprinted beneath the image.


Nathaniel Currier, whose successful New York-based lithography firm began in 1835, produced thousands of prints in various sizes that together create a vivid panorama of mid-to-late nineteenth century American life and its history. People eagerly acquired such lithographs featuring picturesque scenery, rural and city views, ships, railroads, portraits, hunting and fishing scenes, domestic life and numerous other subjects, as an inexpensive way to decorate their homes or business establishments. As the firm expanded, Nathaniel included his younger brother Charles in the business. In 1857, James Merritt Ives (the firm's accountant since 1852 and Charles's brother-in-law) was made a business partner; subsequently renamed Currier & Ives, the firm continued until 1907.