Rhapsodies in Black takes a fresh look at the Harlem Renaissance, contesting narrow interpretations of it as an isolated phenomenon confined to artists of color inhabiting a few square miles of Manhattan and, instead, recognizing it as a historical moment of global significance, with connections to Europe, Africa, the Caribbean, and other parts of the United States, in particular Chicago and the Deep South.

Like jazz musicians, the artists of the Harlem Renaissance era traveled and interacted, and their art was cosmopolitan, inspired by European modernism as well as the cultural and artistic groundswell of black America.

Two influences dominated in the art of early modernism: African art and the vitality of big city life. In Harlem, as in Paris and Berlin, artists were inspired to seek new forms and to collaborate on performances, films, and publications. Rhapsodies in Black speaks across the arts, reaching out from an exploration of the painters and sculptors of the time to consider film, theater, and dance.

With contributions by distinguished authors from both sides of the Atlantic, it offers a kaleidoscope of provocative readings, showing that the issues and ideas of the Harlem Renaissance still resonate today.