Emma Amos (Atlanta, 1937 - 2020) was an American painter and printmaker associated with the civil rights era and postmodern art. Choosing to pursue art as a young Black woman at that time was a radical decision, and her career reflects the obstacles and the determination it required.
Before committing fully to painting, she worked as a textile designer, and that experience later shaped her figurative works, which combined fabric, African textiles and sewing techniques on large unframed canvases. In the 1960s she became the only woman invited to join Spiral, a collective of African American artists founded in 1963. By the mid-1970s she was depicting Black women in everyday scenes, such as American Girl and Pool Lady, and in 1994 she painted a self-portrait in which a Wonder Woman costume peeks out beneath a dark coat.
Her work is held in collections including the National Gallery of Art and the Museum of Modern Art. She also designed the memorial to civil rights leader Ralph Abernathy in Atlanta. Her legacy lies in questioning which artists, and which bodies, belong in the canon of art.