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SIU

In essence, the object of prescriptive criticism is to help the Black artist to produce works, no matter what idiom, that are psychologically meaningful to the Black community. Aesthetically tough works reveal and express meanings that point to large meanings. They are not governed by the exigencies of fashion; aesthetically tough works provide a recreative wellspring, and they speak to the psyche.

Community solidarity only exists when there are integrating factors, generally manifested in shared ideas and cultural values. In the broadest sense the Black artist provides the visual means by which commonly held ideas and values may be metaphorically expressed, revealing a collective portrait. This does not mean that all works by Black artists must be the same. For the collective portrait encompasses both the positive and the negative, the realistic and the non-mimetic because the artist is only one of the culture agents and his experiences are at once inspired and defined by other aspects of culture.

In light of the former, let us assert that some measure of prescriptive criticism is palatable and that it is desirable for the Black artist to produce works that are not just descriptive, but ones that define and reveal. The question still remains: How can the Black artist create more aesthetically tough art? In this regard, there are three points to be made.

The first point is that Black artists will produce aesthetically tough statements when they produce more art. Although there are exceptions, Black artists generally produce so few works. For reasons well known, there are only a small number of Black artists who have developed their skills and have sufficient patronage to create the quantity and quality of works. Yet, among the Black artists martinal commitment, romantic and fallacious notions about inspiration as the basis of creative expression are encountered more than once. And rather than focus on the aesthetic aspects of his work, the Black artist has too often struggled with developing technical proficiency. Problems of a technical nature must be mastered early and should be the least concern of the Black artist; unfortunately, all too frequently this is not the case.