Kara Walker (American, born 1969). <em>Keys to the Coop</em>, 1997. Linocut on paper, 46 1/4 x 60 1/2 in. (117.5 x 153.7 cm). Brooklyn Museum, Robert A. Levinson Fund, 1997.152. © artist or artist's estate (Photo: Brooklyn Museum, 1997.152_SL3.jpg)

Kara Walker (American, born 1969). Keys to the Coop, 1997. Linocut on paper, 46 1/4 x 60 1/2 in. (117.5 x 153.7 cm). Brooklyn Museum, Robert A. Levinson Fund, 1997.152. © artist or artist's estate (Photo: Brooklyn Museum, 1997.152_SL3.jpg)

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Download our app and ask your own questions during your visit. Here are some that others have asked.

I don't get this one...it's disturbing, grotesque, but hard to articulate what it represents

The significance of the piece is definitely open to interpretation, but it seems to suggest that she has gotten access to the chicken coop as she holds a key in the one hand and the head of a chicken in the other.

Kara Walker often plays with provocative or problematic imagery. In the label, the curator also provides an additional interpretation of this scene when she writes: "Walker portrays a self-empowered anti-heroine who possesses the key to her own salvation, in stark black-and-white."

In general, the visual vocabulary of Walker alludes to the slave plantation world evoking stereotypical images and situations from black memorabilia, folklore, historical novels, movies, cartoons, and the 19th century slave autobiography.

In general, Walker includes in her work stereotypical characters featuring the master, the mistress, the Negress/slave mistress, and other characters that reference Civil War imagery from the South such as plantation mansions, shackled slaves, Confederate soldiers, and Southern belles. This linocut representation of the girl with the keys is part of the artist's signature wall installations that Walker designs conveying distressing and provocative narratives of plantation life and slavery in the united states.

What do you think the key is alluding to?

The significance of the key is definitely open to interpretation, but it seems to suggest that she has gotten access to the chicken coop. Kara Walker often plays with provocative or problematic imagery.

In the label the curator also provides an additional interpretation of this scene when she writes: "Walker portrays a self-empowered anti-heroine who possesses the key to her own salvation, in stark black-and-white. This image also provocatively alludes to food, gender, and racial mythologies, subjects that Walker often foregrounds in her work."

Keys to the Coop

Kara Walker

Contemporary Art

Kara Walker has succeeded in developing a signature visual vocabulary that is instantly recognizable for its engagement with both nineteenth-century imaging techniques and the historical period of the American antebellum South. In Keys to the Coop, Walker depicts a young African American girl in bold silhouette, holding the decapitated head of a chicken in one hand, while in the other she nonchalantly twirls a large key. Walker portrays a self-empowered anti-heroine who possesses the key to her own salvation, in stark black-and-white. This image also provocatively alludes to food, gender, and racial mythologies, subjects that Walker often foregrounds in her work.

ARTIST Kara Walker, American, born 1969

MEDIUM Linocut on paper

DATES 1997

DIMENSIONS 46 1/4 x 60 1/2 in. (117.5 x 153.7 cm) (show scale)

SIGNATURE Signed upper right: "KW '97"

INSCRIPTIONS Inscribed upper left in graphite: "Keys to the Coop"

COLLECTIONS Contemporary Art

ACCESSION NUMBER 1997.152

CREDIT LINE Robert A. Levinson Fund

EXHIBITIONS

MUSEUM LOCATION This item is not on view

CAPTION Kara Walker (American, born 1969). Keys to the Coop, 1997. Linocut on paper, 46 1/4 x 60 1/2 in. (117.5 x 153.7 cm). Brooklyn Museum, Robert A. Levinson Fund, 1997.152. © artist or artist's estate (Photo: Brooklyn Museum, 1997.152_SL3.jpg)

IMAGE overall, 1997.152_SL3.jpg. Brooklyn Museum photograph, 2015

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Download our app and ask your own questions during your visit. Here are some that others have asked.

I don't get this one...it's disturbing, grotesque, but hard to articulate what it represents

What do you think the key is alluding to?