Jonny Mae

Wille Cole is widely recognized for his extraordinary capacity to convert ordinary objects into evocative works of art. In the intaglio and relief print Jonny Mae, Cole transforms an image resembling a household ironing board into a powerful metaphor for the historical role of Black women serving as “domestic help.” The print is part of an extended series of similar prints known as “The Beauties” that alludes to real and fictional members of Cole’s ancestral family who toiled as domestic workers, either as enslaved or free women. For Cole, the ironing board motif is emblematic of the drudgery and harsh reality of ceaseless household labor, while also recalling the form of a monument or tombstone, traditional ways of marking or measuring one’s life. The elongated images also resemble standing human figures, their individuality fixed by the assigned names and unique visual and textural characteristics of each ironing board.