49 Quotes by Kara Walker

A lot of my work has been about the unexpected – that kind of wanting to be the heroine and yet wanting to kill the heroine at the same time. That kind of dilemma – that push and pull – is the underlying turbulence that I bring to each of the pieces that I make.

I often compare my method of working to that of a well-meaning freed woman in a Northern state who is attempting to delineate the horrors of Southern slavery but with next to no resources, other than some paper and a pen knife and some people she’d like to kill.

I’m fascinated with the stories that we tell. Real histories become fantasies and fairy tales, morality tales and fables.

Sugar crystallizes something in our American soul. It is emblematic of all industrial processes. And of the idea of becoming white. White being equated with pure and 'true': it takes a lot of energy to turn brown things into white things. A lot of pressure.