Rockafellow and Love create art to celebrate Black History Month

By Felecia Piggott-Long, Ph.D.  When Grace Humphreys Rockafellow, 86,  was invited to participate in a reading of African American Literature, Renee Andrews, known as “The Story Lady,” asked Rockafellow to display her collection of African American art. Fitness instructor Emma Love, 48, came to the same reading to participate as a performer, and she decided to present her art along with her original poem, “My Skin Screams.”   Rockafellow presented prints and lithographs of men and women who were first in their fields. Love’s portraits are called “No Faces No Names,” because her silhouettes do not portray any person in particular.  Dr. Elwanda Ingram was impressed with Rockafellow’s portraits and the silhouettes of Emma Love. Love is Dr. Ingram’s aerobics instructor, and Rockafellow is in Ingram’s yoga class.  “Both of them are honoring African American men and women, although one artist is African American and the other is Caucasian. People are visual, and they like to see pictures to help them to visualize what these leaders look like,” said Ingram. “It is interesting to observe Black women trailblazers. Their work reaffirms the idea that literacy and freedom go together. Unless a person learns to read, he or she tends not to...