Yellow House

Broad strokes of blue and white watercolor fill the sky above a large creole cottage, a distinctive type of early 19th-century New Orleans architecture. Perhaps this house, whose address is still unidentified, held special meaning for Joseph Thomas Williams. Rather than showing its front entrance, he depicted the gate to the courtyard between the main house and the two-story kitchen and servants’ quarters. This perspective would have been familiar to a housekeeper, such as his mother, or an ice delivery man, like his father. During his Federal Art Project employment, Williams also taught art classes to fellow Black adults and children.