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Motley, Archibald. "Nightlife." 1943, Art Institute Chicago.

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“Like the others, they were country people, but how soon country people forget. When they fall in love with a city, it is for forever, and it is like forever. As though there never was a time when they didn't love it” (Morrison, 33).

Motley’s Nightlife is an energetic depiction of a vibrant crowded nightclub in Chicago, which very much resembles the urban allure of Harlem. The painting showcases the liveliness of social interactions at the time, and distinctly focuses on African American urban life and joy. In many ways, the painting’s vitality gives it a musical element, and in my opinion it almost sings to the viewer. Likewise, the quote idealizes the city as a cultural haven with unlimited opportunities. This idea of the city as a melting pot of different African American experiences—urban and rural, rich and poor—is pervasive throughout the entire novel. These aspects come to form a new American dream, or the sound of the city which can also be interpreted as jazz music. Jazz becomes a way to express the loss of old traditions while also serving as a celebration of everything the city, and by extension the North, has become and has to offer. It deals with the idea of escaping from generational trauma impressed into Black southern communities, and turning to urban life for joy, creative expression, and love.

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Fuseli, Henry. "The Nightmare." 1781, Detroit Institute of Arts.

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“Dorcas, girl, your first time and mine. I chose you. Nobody gave you to me. Nobody said that's the one for you. I picked you out. Wrong time, yep, and doing wrong by my wife. But the picking out, the choosing. Don't ever think I fell for you, or fell over you. I didn't fall in love, I rose in it” (Morrison, 135).

Fuseli’s Nightmare depicts a woman in a deep, dreamlike state as she experiences a nightmare. A demonic and ape-like creature crouches over her chest, overtly communicating a sense of control and obsession. At the time, the painting was the center of controversy due to its suggestive nature. The red drapes behind the woman could symbolize blood, or a level of theatrics and performance in the scene. The only source of light falls on the sleeping woman, and as light slowly escapes the scene as we pans away from her. This represents that we may never fully know what horrors lurk in the dark, which troubles the unconscious mind set on dreaming. In many ways, this painting can be applied to Joe and Dorcas’s relationship. As an older man, Joe develops an obsession with Dorcas and begins to stalk her in a hunter-like manner. Joe asserts his agency in choosing Dorcas, and in their relationship there was never a sense of passivity—only intentionality on Joe’s part. Joe’s language reduces Dorcas to something chosen, he ultimately views her as an object of desire rather than an equal participant in their twisted relationship. The last line defines Joe’s love as an action, rather than something that he stumbles upon. Their relationship was not conventional in any sense of the word, their love was never tied to the idea of romanticism. Morrison uses their relationship as just one example of how racial oppression and the state of being unloved can culminate into a tragic tale of obsession and abuse.

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File:Johann Heinrich Füssli - The Nightmare 55.5.A-d1-2019-04-15.jpg - Wikipedia

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Savage, Augusta. "Lift Every Voice and Sing (The Harp)." 1939.

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“It was the music. The dirty, get-on-down music the women sang and the men played and both danced to, close and shameless or apart and wild. Alice was convinced and so were the Miller sisters as they blew into cups of Postum in the kitchen. It made you do unwise, disorderly things. Just hearing it was like violating the law” (Morrison, 58).

Named after Rosamond Johnson's song "Lift Every Voice and Sing,” The Harp is a towering sculpture formed by a long arm and hand cradling twelve singers representative of strings. The sculpture is representative of themes both found in the song it pays homage to, and explores themes about the transformative and unifying nature of music. The quote above reflects a more opposing view of music. Alice, who said the quote, is very much opposed to the idea of jazz music coating the streets she calls home. She condemns jazz music as crude, chaotic, and unrefined. She believes that the music encourages people to throw away their inhibitions and to act without restraint. The idea of dancing “close and shameless” suggests that jazz music embodies sexual freedom and emotional spontaneity, which Alice views as dangerous and socially unacceptable, especially for her niece, Dorcas. Alice’s views reflect an older worldview completely disconnected from the newfound freedoms in the city that jazz music embodies. On the contrary, The Harp statue reflects an espousal of these aspects of music.

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“….if you was or claimed to be colored, you had to be new and stay the same every day the sun rose and every night it dropped. And let me tell you, baby, in those days it was more than a state of mind" (Morrison, 135).

Barber’s wood carving palpably depicts the struggles of being Black in America; how, there are never ending obstacles to keep a system intact that negatively perceives blackness. This quote from Jazz addresses the intersection between identity, race, and social expectation. It highlights the rigid, oppressive nature of how Black people were expected to navigate their identities, particularly in the Reconstruction era in the southern U.S. There is an imposition of consistency, that Black people were expected to constantly attend to white expectation and conform to what it meant to be Black in an overtly racist society. The idea that one had to constantly stay the same in order to survive enforces the notion that any deviation from what society expected from you resulted in alienation. The last sentence enforces the idea that race was something people were forced to conform to and perform daily, and this had tangible effects on their lives. Barber’s piece and Morrison’s quote work in tandem with each other to communicate similar ideas, and it is startling that two works of art reflecting time periods separated by centuries can illustrate the same points.

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Saar, Allison. "Jitterbug." 2019, Princeton Museum of Art 

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"Somebody in the house across the alley put a record on and the music floated in to us through the open window. Mr. Trace moved his head to the rhythm and his wife snapped her fingers in time. She did a little step in front of him and he smiled. By and by they were dancing. Funny, like old people do, and I laughed for real. Not because of how funny they looked. Something in it made me feel I shouldn't be there. Shouldn't be looking at them doing that” (Morrison, 214).

Jitterbug’s unapologetic vibrance and joy portrays intimate spaces and moments of togetherness, or love. The movement in the print reflects the importance of trusting human relationships bridged together with dance, togetherness, lyrics, and tunes. The deep yellow contrasts and colors reflect cheerfulness, optimism, and energy. All of which are present in the quote depicting Joe and Violet dancing together. The passage highlights the deep emotional connection between the married couple despite the several deep flaws present in the relationship. Their dance reflects a lifetime of shared moments, understanding, and mutual affection that can’t be easily disrupted—only changed. The way the music in the scene flows through the open window symbolizes music’s transformative power to connect people. In this situation, it serves as a bridge between two lost lovers that helps them reconnect after years of miscommunication and staleness between them. Both the print and quote capture the essential idea that music, jazz music in this situation, first and foremost represents the changeable nature of being human.

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Klimt, Gustav. "The Kiss." 1907-1908, Österreichische Galerie. 

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“That I have loved only you, surrendered my whole self reckless to you and nobody else. That I want you to love me back and show it to me. That I love the way you hold me, how close you let me be to you. I like your fingers on and on, lifting, turning. I have watched your face for a long time now, and missed your eyes when you went away from me. Talking to you and hearing you answer—that's the kick” (Morrison, 229).

Klimt’s The Kiss is a grand love scene of two faces and bodies embracing each other. The painting is tender and passionate, but above all it is about love. Likewise, Jazz is centrally a novel about the complicated nature of loving. In particular, Morrison seeks to put words to what it means to love. She suggests that to love is to express a complete surrender of self. That one offers their love without reservation, but seeks reciprocity and affirmation for love. The imagery of touch, gaze, and conversation all work to highlight the intricate dynamics of intimacy, which affirms that love is both a personal engagement and a continuous, ever-evolving one with another person. Morrison seeks to speak to the complexity and depth of human relationships. The Kiss encourages these same ideas; the two figures are at the edge of cosmos with only one thing: their love for each other.

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