The Migration Series, Panel no. 33: Letters from relatives in the North told of the better life there.

This private moment depicts a woman reading a letter from a relative who had since moved North, to a child who sits in bed with her. This touching and intimate scene is heavy with a sad tone of missing relatives who tell of a better, more prosperous life away from home. The large, triangular bed widens the space and swallows up the figures within it, highlighting the difficulty of leaving one’s home.
SKU: 64035
Creator: Jacob Lawrence
Date: between 1940 and 1941
Original Medium: Casein tempera on hardboard
Original Size: 12 x 18 in.
Location: The Phillips Collection
© 2016 The Jacob and Gwendolyn Knight Lawrence Foundation, Seattle / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York