"If It Hasn't Been One of Color": An Interview With Roy DeCarava

Abstract

DECARAVA: There is a black aesthetic-it comes out of a cultural history. Blacks brought with them part of their history and philosophical ideas. In Africa there was always an emphasis on the spiritual, the mythic. Art was a facet of communication with the gods, a part of everyday life. think that Africans brought some of those ideas and memories with them and handed them down. This creates a different attitude toward life than a European's. The black aesthetic is about communication. It is both an intuitive sense and a conscious choice. A matter of being understood, and being heard. Even if it was to say, hurt, I'm hurting, hate this, or I hate you. It's still a form of relating and of content. The way things are going now [among white artists] the sky's the limit, you can do what you please. In fact, the trend today in art is to be responsible to the process. To be dispassionate and objective. To use the process itself as the message. My feeling is that the black artist looks at the same world in a different way than a Euro-American artist. He has a different agenda.