Zombie Jamboree

Keith Morrison, Zombie Jamboree, 1988, oil on canvas, Smithsonian American Art Museum, Museum purchase through the Catherine Walden Myer Fund and the Director's Discretionary Fund, 1990.76
Copied Keith Morrison, Zombie Jamboree, 1988, oil on canvas, 62 x 69 3⁄16 in. (157.5 x 175.7 cm.), Smithsonian American Art Museum, Museum purchase through the Catherine Walden Myer Fund and the Director’s Discretionary Fund, 1990.76

Artwork Details

Title
Zombie Jamboree
Artist
Date
1988
Location
Not on view
Dimensions
62 x 69 3⁄16 in. (157.5 x 175.7 cm.)
Credit Line
Museum purchase through the Catherine Walden Myer Fund and the Director’s Discretionary Fund
Mediums
Mediums Description
oil on canvas
Classifications
Subjects
  • Figure group
  • Animal
  • Landscape — tropic
Object Number
1990.76
Linked Open Data
https://edan.si.edu/saam/id/object/1990.76

Artwork Description

For Zombie Jamboree, Morrison drew on a personal lexicon of myths and images. Both sacred and secular, it derives simultaneously from the memory of the death of a childhood friend and the artist’s encounter with Christianity and vodun, a religion traditional to his native Jamaica. The large central figures are fantastical animals. A spotted hyena-like creature with bared teeth that sparks an impression of evil and greed confronts a protective horse, while a hissing snake, the Christian symbol of sin, hovers above. Dotted around this improbable cast of characters are Christian crosses, dancing skeletons, and two black figures, one wearing a mask the other with arms raised, suggesting African rituals.


African American Art: Harlem Renaissance, Civil Rights Era, and Beyond, 2012
Luce Center Label

In Zombie Jamboree, Keith Morrison combines imagery taken from both African and European sources. The strange creatures in the foreground recall stories of voodoo rituals that the artist heard while growing up in Jamaica. Many of these tales involved creatures or spirits rising from the water, and here a floating figure eerily emerges from the pond behind the animals. The fantastical ghosts dancing in the background were inspired by Benjamin Britten's opera The Turn of the Screw, and the floating figure conjures the tragic character of Shakespeare's Ophelia. Zombie Jamboree contains many symbols of birth, death, and resurrection, themes that recur in much of Morrison's work.