Diadamia Doram

Diadamia Doram

Patrick Henry Davenport Kentucky
1839
Oil on canvas
2000.29.2
On loan from Kentucky Society, NSDAR

Diadamia Doram and her husband Dennis had the freedom and ability to do something that most Blacks in America could not in the early 19th century. The fact that the Dorams could afford portraits of themselves placed them in an economic status held predominantly by whites in antebellum America. For the Dorams, ownership of portraits was a way to assert themselves as social equals to other affluent members of their community.