Jacob Lawrence

Lawrence was born in State New Jersey. In 1919 he lived in Pennsylvania and after his parents' separation he moved with his mother to Philadelphia. She eventually found work in New York and at the age of thirteen, Jacob Lawrence arrived in Harlem.

In 1993 Robert Hughes wrote on the occasion of the exhibition of Jacob Lawrence' Migration series that 'The works haven't been shown in two decades, but they constitute the first, and arguably still the best, treatment of black-American historical experience by a black artist.' Lawrence died on June 9, 2000 at the age of eighty-two.