"A successful hybrid of art and narrative, arranged chronologically and invitingly."--Janet Maslin, New York Times "Fascinating.filled with powerful images of black art from photographs to paintings to quilts that tell the story of black America. Readers interested in black American art and history will appreciate this beautiful and well-researched book."-- Booklist "A sweeping, historic narrative with the emotional expression of more than 150 works of African-American art."-- Ebony "Nell Irvin Painter is a towering intellectual figure and pre-eminent historian in American life. This overarching narrative is the best we have that makes sense of the doings and sufferings of black people from 1619 to 2005."--Cornel West, Princeton University "A brilliant historian, Nell Irvin Painter has written an innovative account of African Americans from the colonial era to our own.

She challenges us to think critically about the historical meanings conveyed via artistic creations. In other words, Creating Black America offers a new way of knowing, imagining, and visualizing the past of our present."--Darlene Clark Hine, co-author of The African-American Odyssey "There is a philosopher's axiom, 'To be is to be perceived.' Nell Painter's fascinatingly significant Creating Black Americans captures its subject-matter through the self-images people of color have produced over time. She has written a critical history of self-perception that deserves wide review and lively discussion."--David Levering Lewis, University Professor and Professor of History, New York University "Utilizing her pathbreaking approach to historical writing, a hallmark in her brilliant career, Nell Painter interweaves straight-forward narrative with the vivid portraits of black artists to record how an unloved people created a vibrant but still endangered black America."--Derrick Bell, author of Silent Covenants: Brown v. Board and the Unfulfilled Hopes for Racial Reform "From the Triangle Trade to Russel Simmons, this comprehensive review of African American history is a lively, lucid and indispensable resource.

Nell Painter is our foremost chronicler of the black experience in the United States."--Patricia Williams, Columbia University School of Law "Nell Irvin Painter brings her considerable skills and insight to 'Creating Black Americans.' Her excellent introduction to the black American experience will serve any interested reader well. History, the author notes, exists in both the past and present. What we wish to know and how we understand it changes over time. And Painter's compelling use of black art, mostly created since the mid-20th century, to illustrate earlier times, emphasizes this point to great effect."--Kenneth R. Janken, New York Post "Enriching on several levels, Creating Black Americans is a masterpiece because it offers a deeper understanding of all the painful suffering and adversity endured by a proud and determined people, while simultaneously bearing witness to a cultural legacy equally rich with strength, hope and faith.

"-- Baltimore Afro-American.