However, the voice could equally be that of an adult, because who can’t look back upon teachers or other early mentors who gave of themselves and offered their pupils so much? Indeed, some of the self-aware, self-assured expressions herein seem perhaps more realistic as uttered from one who’s already grown. This gentle ode to a teacher’s skill at inspiring, encouraging, and being a role model is spoken, presumably, from a child’s viewpoint. Beautiful, innovative, and full of the joy of one unconquerable soul.Ī paean to teachers and their surrogates everywhere. The triumphant soaring of imagination over reality is beautifully expressed in Ringgold's bold, vibrant paintings, newly rendered to tell this story, and with details from the quilt's glowing patchwork as a delightful continue along the bottom of each page. Combining the traditional association between flying and the escape of slaves to freedom with her own fantasies as a child who delighted in the sense of liberation and empowerment she felt on a rooftop from which she saw stars twinkling among the lights of nearby George Washington Bridge, Ringgold has fashioned a poignant fictional story about eight-year-old Cassie, who dreams that she can claim the bridge (and freedom and wealth) by soaring above the city she can even own the Union Building that her skillful father helped to build-though he is often out of work because he is denied membership in the union. As explained in a concluding note, Ringgold's "Woman on a Bridge" series, including Tar Beach (reproduction included), is now in the Guggenheim. Originally written by Faith Ringgold for her story quilt of the same name, Tar Beach is a seamless weaving of fiction, autobiography, and African-American history and literature. Cover excerpt, Tar Beach by Faith Ringgold, Crown Publishers, New York 1991.A Harlem-born artist expands on one of her distinctive "quilt paintings" to create a marvelously evocative book that draws on her own imaginative life as a child.
This magical story resonates with a universal wish. The next thing you know, you’re flying above the stars.” “All you need is somewhere to go you can’t get to any other way.
She claims the buildings as her own–even the union building, so her father won’t have to worry anymore about not being allowed to join just because his father was not a member. The stars lift her up, and she flies over the city.
One night, up on “tar beach” –the rooftop of her family’s Harlem apartment building–her dream comes true. Cassie Louise Lightfoot, eight years old in 1939, has a dream: to be free to go wherever she wants for the rest of her life.
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