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Accession #	28.384
Artist	Malvina Hoffman
Title	Martinique Woman
Date	1928
Medium	Black Belgian marble
Dimensions	22 × 14 1/4 × 15 1/4 in., 158 lb. (55.9 × 36.2 × 38.7 cm, 71.67kg) mount: 22 1/2 × 13 1/2 × 14 in. (57.2 × 34.3 × 35.6 cm)
Signed	Incised along bottom edge at back: "MALVINA HOFFMAN / © 1928"
Credit Line	Dick S. Ramsay Fund
Location	American Identities: Everyday Life / A Nation Divided
Description	Over-life-sized head of woman with African features, head turned to right in 3/4 profile, hair gathered into small buns all over head, surface of skin is smoothly polished while hair is roughly textured. Medium possibly marble. Condition: Good, few small scratches and nicks overall.

Curatorial Remarks: Although ostensibly a portrait head of a woman from the Caribbean island of Martinique, this sculpture is one of a number of heads based on Malvina Hoffman’s travels through Africa about 1928.

The modernized realism of this work signaled a deliberate break with earlier treatments of African subjects ranging from caricature to romanticism. For many years, however, the critical reception of Hoffman’s work remained firmly embedded in racist language and a Eurocentric point of view.