An assertive Black feminist gaze: The art of Emma Amos

This study probes evidence of the "normative gaze" and a self-examining "double gaze" in Emma Amos's intriguing 1990s compositions. At this time, Amos began using her figures to contradict the idea of black female passivity and anonymity. In these images her subjects are empowered to resist becoming the objects of a patronizing gaze and instead are presented as complex individuals capable of asserting and defending critiques. She scrutinizes the black woman's stand in art portrayals, revealing exploitation of black diasporic and African aesthetics. Amos reclaims the black female body with its inherent power in order to challenge preconceived---and unsubstantiated---ideas about black women as articulated in Western art history.