Art Elements of Blue Monday by Annie Lee

Blue Monday is a painting that I’ve seen many times throughout my life. It was created in 1985 by Annie Lee, an African-American artist who’s work often depicted faceless people in order to show expression and emotion through their bodies. Lee made this piece as a self portrait in Chicago, Illinois when she had the idea while getting ready to catch the bus for work on an early, winter morning. This piece was one of her most famously known paintings. 

    This painting is really familiar to me as I have seen it in so many African-American spaces. Everytime I see it all I can think is “same”, especially the older I get. The feeling of exhaustion that shows on her body is very familiar, she captured the emotions so well without having a face to show the expressions. The color is the most noticeable aspect for me. She used mostly blues and whites, as well as deep blacks and browns for herself to capture the feeling of being “blue” or tired, but she also used these colors in different variations, hues and tones for dimension as well. The blues are bold and intense, but the bright whites in her nightgown, bed, clock and calendar create contrast as well as pull your eyes to the attention of the context. The calendar on the wall makes me feel like she intentionally put it there to give the feeling of time passing by each day, or maybe how the days can feel like they bleed together. The clock shows that the time is “5 o-clock”, which given the context clues we can assume is 5:00 AM. 

    The texture is another important aspect to the piece as she used many different textures to really bring out all of the dimensions. The carpet has a sponge texture to it which really makes it look soft, while the walls have a smooth texture that kind of makes the room look dreamy. The lines are thin and are not perfectly straight which adds to the dreamy aspect of the painting. It all feels very 2 dimensional to me, but the shadowing and light work help bring out some more dimension. The woman is centered within the painting making the expression of her body the most eye catching aspect, and when you look around the rest of the room is when the rest of the context sets in. All in all, I really love this painting and have become so familiar with it as I saw it many times growing up, and now the older I get, the more I can relate to that physical expression of “tired”.