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Watching the Good Trains Go By, 1964 by Romare Bearden (1914-1988) Collage on paper Watching the Good Trains Go By is part of a series of photomontages that recall scenes and rituals from Bearden’s southern upbringing and his adult life in Harlem. This particular work refers to his childhood, when the artist and his grandfather "would visit the train station in the evening to watch the good trains go by." Bearden stated: "I use the train as a symbol of the other civilization the white civilization and its encroachment upon the lives of blacks. The train was always something that could take you away and could also bring you where you were. And in the little towns it's the black people who live near the trains." |