James Washington Jr. (1911-2000) was a sculptor and painter who became associated with the Northwest School of artists in Seattle. He grew up in Mississippi and moved to Seattle in 1944 to work for the Navy during World War II. Washington was largely self-taught and he believed this lack of formal training was essential to his artistic success. In the 1950s, Washington became interested in making sculpture from stone after being inspired by a piece of volcanic rock he found among the ruins of the pyramids at Teotihuacan in Mexico; he later carved it into his first stone sculpture, “Young Boy of Athens.” Washington’s work in both mediums often expressed spiritual feelings and used symbols from Christianity, freemasonry, and the animal world.

This image shows James Washington Jr. giving a group of young women a tour of his studio. The visit was part of the Delta Teen-lift project of Delta Sigma Theta, a historically Black sorority. The project offered young Black women opportunities to learn about different careers by visiting people and places in the community. The young women are identified as, clockwise from left: Royleen Hubbard, Diana King, Virginia Taylor, Brenda Toney, Pamela Reece, and Glynda Slade.

Caption information source: Washington, James Jr (1911-2000), HistoryLink.org Essay 5328, reprinted from Deloris Tarzan Ament's Iridescent Light: The Emergence of Northwest Art, 2002.
Caption information source: "Concert benefits Teen-lift," Seattle Post-Intelligencer, December 6, 1970, page W11.