Vignette (Wishing Well),

2010

<p>In addressing what he has described as the "vacuum in the image bank" of the Western canon, Marshall has made the historical invisibility of the African American experience powerfully visible in his figurative work. While many of his large painted narratives feature contemporary settings like hair salons and housing projects, others are more dreamlike—most notably his ongoing <em>Vignettes</em> series, from which this monumental print derives. Inspired by the amorous fantasies of eighteenth-century French Rococo artists such as Boucher and Fragonard, the <em>Vignettes</em> situate black couples in imaginary landscapes, framed by pink hearts and flowers. In this enigmatic scene a woman throws coins in a wishing well while being spied upon by a man crouching in the bushes.</p>