Hatch-Billops Collection, Inc.

Artist & Influence is an annual journal published by the Hatch-Billops Collection in New York. Among other materials, Hatch-Billops houses an archival collection of oral histories of African American and some Asian and Hispanic artists from all fields of the performing, graphic, and spatial arts. Interviews with Black and Asian filmmakers, actors, musicians, sculptors, photographers, animators, choreographers, singers, and painters, provide new information about the role of minority groups in the development of American arts. Many of the figures whose words are transcribed were elderly when they were interviewed. Their perceptions shed new light on movements such as the Harlem Renaissance, the role of Black musicians during the Depression, or the resistance of Hollywood filmmakers during the 1930s and 40s to using Black actors and actresses. All the interviews will be online and indexed at Alexander Street Press.