The Aaron Douglas &

Alta Sawyer Douglas Foundation

The Aaron Douglas and Alta Sawyer Douglas Foundation  and

Wisdom House Books

are pleased to announce

the publication of 

Aaron Douglas and Alta Sawyer Douglas:

Love Letters from the Harlem Renaissance.

To purchase your copy of

Aaron and Alta Sawyer Douglas: Love Letters from the Harlem Renaissance,

please contact the Aaron Douglas and Alta Sawyer Douglas Foundation.

The Aaron Douglas and

Alta Sawyer Douglas Foundation

P.O. Box  67632

Topeka, KS  66667

From the Introduction of Aaron Douglas and Alta Sawyer Douglas: Love Letters from the Harlem Renaissance:

         "The Aaron and Alta Sawyer Douglas Foundation sees the publication of these letters between Aaron and Alta Sawyer Douglas as the most intimate description of a connection that ultimately spurred the passionate focus of a career, enduring friendships, mentoring, and family ties—all attracting public attention to Douglas’s artistry. The personal writings of Aaron and Alta Douglas also serve as a backdrop for the era and the intimacies that are described as the Harlem Renaissance “family.” The Foundation publishes these writings to allow Douglas himself to describe the love and dedication that spurred his artistic expressions and personal relationships, beginning in the 1920s and lasting throughout his adult life. The letters are divided into two periods: those written to Alta Sawyer before he moved to Harlem and those written after he left Kansas City but before he and Alta married in 1926.

         Great concern about identity, drive, passion, and inspiring personal relationships was part of the reason that Aaron Douglas gained prominence during the early twentieth-century Harlem Renaissance. Doug, as he was called by his family and friends, gives us his own summation of the relationship between Alta and himself in his handwritten 1968 autobiography. On June 18, 1926, he married Alta Sawyer, describing her as the woman who became the most important factor in his life, his inspiration and encouragement until her death in 1958."