The Widow Of An Indian Chief Watching The Arms Of Her Splendid Husband Summary

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English painter Joseph Wright’s uncontested masterpiece is his work The Widow of an Indian Chief Watching the Arms of Her Deceased Husband. The painting depicts a lone native woman under a tree, mourning her loss. The weather above mirrors her distress: the sky an ominous purple, spiderwebbed with white lighting, while a volcano in the foreground threatens to boil over. With head cradled in hand and shoulders caved downwards, the widow grieves on. It’s her posture that’s most familiar to me. It’s the embodiment of resignation, of defeat. It’s a posture so broken it’s something you see only when the world’s at its worst. I know that slump; I’ve seen it on my closest friend Morgan. It’s the shape she sank into, years ago, when Eric Garner’s …show more content…

Playing a role in the fight for social justice is not nearly as immediate or direct a positive change. Matters of life and death are much more simple than those concerning the complex socioeconomic and political nuances of racial and gender inequality. My help might offend; it’s easy to see how good intentions can seem condescending and empty when someone offers to engage and empower another whose very disempowerment benefits the former. The losses of black women are essentially my gains, and any apologetic gesture could ring hollow and …show more content…

The painting starts a conversation; it sheds light on an important issue. It’s an endeavor to capture and understand the grief of a downtrodden community. However unwieldy or indelicate its execution, it does not appear to have been done with malice; Indian Widow instead offers a chance to start a meaningful discourse on subjugation and oppression. In the same way, my attempts to contribute to the progress black women are making will be flawed, but that doesn’t foreclose the need for me to make them. So although I may feel torn between the desire to do right by my sisters and the fear of saying the wrong thing, at least I’m trying. And I have to try, if for no one else, for

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