On the Art of Steve Prince

By Linda Stratford

*Edward Hopper,* New York Movie, Oil on canvas, 81.92 cm × 101.92 cm, 1939

The following is excerpted from Linda Stratford’s book project, Art and the Search for Meaning. To read more about her book and other 2025 Creo Arts Projects, visit our projects page.

Careful and laborious manual steps are required for any artist’s original print to come to life.

First comes research and design conception, then recreating that design on a block. In the case of relief printing, the artist chips and carves away at the block to allow projected (or “relief”) parts to emerge. Projected parts are inked, pressed or rolled onto paper or other material for image making and, finally, extracted at just the right tempo and with just the right pressure for an intact piece to emerge. At any of these stages, all kinds of material things can and do go wrong — tearing, smearing, press wear or damage as multiples are made. What the patron sees is the final “reveal” following slow, focused thought matched by steps of physical exertion and care.

Why go through all these steps? Why go to all this trouble?

Artist Steve Prince, whose work includes large-scale linoleum relief prints depicting decisive moments in the history of the American civil rights movement explains, “The labor that I do is hard. It’s time-consuming, it’s tedious . . . but it’s worth something because I’m continuing to give voice to the voiceless . . . I do not want us to forget those lives.”

We can forget history, but we can’t “unsee” a work of art. A strong work remains in our memories even as details fade with time. Not only does Prince “not want us to forget those lives,” he wants us to see the lives of advocates who widened the black American experience in and as episodes of spiritual battle. His prints cast the black American experience in moments large, memorable and beyond earthly scope.

Careful and laborious steps allow this in Nine Little Indians. A leftward press of bodies shoots across the piece, carrying nine African American students across a 5-foot width to arrive at Central High School in Little Rock, Arkansas. Formal crowding – compression, and lack of breathing room — recreates the sense of aggression experienced by young students who entered the school amidst jeers, death threats, and racial epithets.

One finds a mix of ages, races, stages, and walks of life. There are a variety of postures at work, some pointing, accusing and angry; others horrified, transfixed or tenaciously stalwart. Iconic visual elements include the Stars and Stripes as well as the Bible. On the students’ bodies, symbolic breastplates and other gear signal imagery of protection, referencing the Apostle Paul’s admonition to wear “the armor of God” when facing strife. An armor of God “AOG” patch is worn by one student, ensuring we see this episode for its larger-than-political messaging.

An AOG badge is found as well on the protagonist in Rosa Sparks. Prince has played on the name Rosa Parks, employing “Sparks” in the work’s title to highlight Parks’ role as a catalyst for resistance. Her moment here would indeed ignite the broader civil rights movement.

Because of ongoing historical work exposing the important role played by women in the early civil rights movement, we can all the more appreciate what is pictured here in Parks’ posture.[1] Despite the late hour of the workday, antagonism from the angry bus driver, and protests outside the bus windows, Parks neither moves nor slumps (despite what was surely an experience of weariness and weight, as suggested by a heavily drooping bus cord). She faces forward, bearing a prominent halo as if reminding the viewer of Apostle Paul’s admonitions to Christians to face trials with expectant hope (Romans 8; Philippians 4).

In a similar vein, the aptly-titled Salt of the Earth recreates the resistant stance of “the Greensboro Four” when in 1960 four African American college students staged a peaceful sit-in at the F.W. Woolworth store in Greensboro, North Carolina, refused lunch service. The four affix themselves to the counter as preservers of truth and justice, wearing the AOG badge and enduring taunts from a particularly loud agitator. At the same time, the groups’ sharply diagonal orientation draws us to a very different figure in the background, a lone figure quietly troubled.

The waitress in question is deeply introspective. Will she serve the four at the lunch counter? Will she do what she believes to be right? Or will she give in to surrounding pressure?

The pull of Steve Prince’s work is found in socially riveting narratives with focus on such moments as early public-school integration, refusal to move to the back of the bus, and peaceful sit-ins. His works prove memorable by drawing upon elements and principles of design, symbols, art historical references, and allusive titles. His hope is that his large-scale prints, along with his popular community print workshops, will serve as “prompts for communal action” ultimately derived from a liberating inner Christian faith.

The discipline required as a printmaker — giving material expression to focused and purposeful design — will then have been worth the effort.

[1] Danielle McGuire. At the Dark End of the Street: Black Women, Rape and Resistance, 2011.

Linda Stratford, Ph.D is a historian, writer and educator whose chief mission is to stir up thoughtful discussion about art. Originally a student of studio art, her career trajectory branched into teacher-scholar, creating innovative higher education deliverables such as Asbury University’s Paris Semester overseas; co-founding The Association of Scholars of Christianity in the History of Art (ASCHA); and joining Creo Arts as Scholar-in-Residence.

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On the Art of Steve Prince

By Linda Stratford

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