About This Artwork

Archibald John Motley, Jr.
American, 1891-1981

Self-Portrait, c. 1920

Oil on canvas
76.3 x 56 cm (30 1/8 x 22 1/8 in.)
Signed upper left: A. J. MOTLEY JR.
Through prior acquisitions of Friends of American Art Collection; through prior bequest of Marguerita S. Ritman, 1995.239

Exhibition, Publication and Ownership Histories

Exhibition History

Chicago Historical Society, The Art of Archibald J. Motley, Jr., October 23, 1991-March 17, 1992, cat. 6, pp. 7, 72 (ill.); traveled to NY, Studio Museum of Harlem, April 5-June 10, 1992; Atlanta, GA, High Museum/Georgia-Pacific Gallery, June 29-September 25, 1992; Washington, D.C., Corcoran Gallery of Art, October 10, 1992-January 3, 1993.

Chicago, Terra Museum of American Art, On Process: Studio Themes, January 12-March 4, 2001, checklist (unnumbered).

Art Institute of Chicago, Kraft Center, Faces, Places, Inner Spaces.

Publication History

Jontyle Theresa Robinson and Wendy Greenhouse, The Art of Archibald J. Motley, Jr., exh. cat. (Chicago Historical Society, 1991), pages? ill.

Art Institute of Chicago Department of Museum Education, Many Faces: Modern Portraits and Identities (1997), cover ill., pp. 24 (ill.), 25, 42 (ill.).

Amy M. Mooney, “Representing Race: Disjunctures in the Work of Archibald J. Motley, Jr.,” Art Institute of Chicago Museum Studies 24, 2 (1999), pp. 162-179, fig. 1.

Andrea D. Barnwell and Kirsten P. Buick, “A Portfolio of Works by African American Artists Continuing the Dialogue: A Work in Progress,” Art Institute of Chicago Museum Studies 24, 2 (1999), p. 185.

Amy M. Mooney, Archibald J. Motley, Jr. (Pomegranate, 2004), pp. 4-11, pl. 1.

Judith A. Barter et al., "American Modernism at the Art Institute of Chicago, From World War I to 1955," (Art Institute of Chicago/Yale University Press, 2009), cat. 145.

Ownership History

Archibald J. Motley, Jr.; to Mrs. Flossie Motley (artist's sister), Chicago; to Charlotte C. Duplessis (daughter of Flossie Moore), Chicago; [Robert Henry Adams Fine Art], sold to the Art Institute of Chicago.