Augusta Savage

Augusta Savage was an American sculptor of the Harlem Renaissance and a teacher of a generation of artists. Born Augusta Fells in Jacksonville, Florida, in 1892, she studied at Cooper Union in New York from 1921; in 1923 a summer school at Fontainebleau withdrew its offer when its American committee learned she was Black, the first of her many public fights for equal rights. Her Savage Studio of Arts and Crafts taught Jacob Lawrence, Norman Lewis and Gwendolyn Knight, and in 1937 she became director of the Harlem Community Art Center. Her 16-foot plaster Lift Every Voice and Sing, or The Harp, made for the 1939 New York World's Fair, was destroyed when the fair closed.