Latest News in Black Art features updates and developments in the world of art and related culture
Joyce J. Scott’s 50-year retrospective opens at the Baltimore Museum of Art in March 2024. | Photo by Joseph Hyde, Courtesy Goya Contemporary
EXHIBITIONS
Coming soon in spring 2024, the Baltimore Museum of Art (BMA) and Seattle Art Museum (SAM) are co-organizing a career retrospective of artist Joyce J. Scott. Baltimore-based Scott works primarily with beads and glass making beautiful sculptures and wearable works that often employ humor to address serious social matters, including racism, gender issues, environmental degradation, and the dynamics of family. The exhibition will feature more than 120 works spanning five decades, including early woven tapestries, soft sculpture, performance footage, prints, and archival materials from the artist’s collection. A newly commissioned installation and a scholarly publication will accompany the show. “Joyce J. Scott: Walk a Mile in My Dreams” opens at BMA on March 24, 2024, and travels to SAM in October. (8/8) | More
Emanoel Araújo (1940-2022). At right, EMANOEL ARAUJO, “Escotilha,” 2021 (wood, automotive paint, formica, stainless steel, shells, soda can, 93 1/4 x 34 5/8 x 19 1/4 inches). | Courtesy the estate and Jack Shainman Gallery
REPRESENTATION
The Estate of Emanoel Araújo is now represented by Jack Shainman Gallery in New York. Araújo was an Afro-Brazilian artist, curator, museum director, and collector. In the announcement, the gallery described his practice: “Araújo’s work functions on multiple registers, merging the formal language developed in his studies, the unapologetic embrace of his queer, Black, and Brazilian identity, and the intricate ideologies of his life as a curator and collector of Afro-Brazilian artwork and artifacts. With simplified figures, primary structures, and high-contrast palates, his engravings, reliefs, and sculptures are assemblages of reference: a mosaic of his upbringing in the Afro-Brazilian capital, inherited trauma from Brazil’s transatlantic slave trade, patterns from Nigerian and Beninois textiles, and Yoruba symbols of Orisha spirits.” On Sept. 12, Jack Shainman will present its first exhibition with the artist, the first major survey of Araújo in New York since the 1980s. (8/8) | More
Jack Shainman Gallery is also representing Jesse Krimes, whose work spans drawing, sculpture, quilting, installation, and found photography. A practicing artist before, during, and after serving time in federal and state prison, Krimes “explores how contemporary media shapes and reinforces societal mechanisms of power and control, with a particular focus on criminal and racial justice.” A multidisciplinary artist, curator, and advocate, he is the founder and executive director of the Center for Art and Advocacy, an artist-led organization that supports “justice-impacted creatives.” Krimes splits his time between New York and Philadelphia. (7/28) | More
AWARDS & HONORS
The Smithsonian’s Archives of American Art is recognizing curator Ruth Fine (left) with The Lawrence A. Fleischman Award for Scholarly Excellence in the Field of American Art History. Fine retired from the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C. (1972-2012), where she served as the first curator of modern prints and drawings and first curator of special projects in modern art. During her tenure at the National Gallery, Fine curated “The Art of Romare Bearden” (2003-04), a comprehensive retrospective and the museum’s first-ever solo exhibition of an African American artist. More recently, she organized “Procession: The Art of Norman Lewis” (2015-17) and co-curated “Frank Stewart’s Nexus: An American Photographer’s Journey, 1960s to the Present,” currently on view at the Phillips Collection in Washington. In 2017, she donated her papers to the Archives of American Art. Fine will receive the 2023 award at the Archives gala in New York City on Oct. 24. Photo by Frank Stewart (8/7) | More
In Philadelphia, Pa., the 2023 BlackStar Film Festival Awards celebrated a new crop of films and talented filmmakers. Artist and filmmaker Ja’Tovia Gary was among those recognized, earning an honorable mention in the Best Experimental Film category. Gary directed “Quiet As It’s Kept,” a cinematic response to “The Bluest Eye” (1970), Toni Morrison’s first novel. (8/7) | More
APPOINTMENTS
The National Endowment for the Humanities appointed Ageliki “Angel” Key (right) as White House liaison. A veteran of the tech industry, Key previously worked at the White House in the Office of Presidential Personnel. Photo courtesy NEH (7/20) | More
TALKS
Ruth J. Simmons was named the 2023 Jefferson Lecturer in the Humanities by the National Endowment for the Humanities. The annual lecture is the federal government’s highest honor for distinguished intellectual achievement in the field. Simmons is a professor, author, and president emerita of three major higher education institutions: Prairie View A&M University, Brown University, and Smith College. She sits on the board of the Smithsonian’s National Museum of African American History and Culture in Washington, D.C., where she will deliver the 50th Jefferson Lecture on the topic of “Facing History to Find a Better Future” on Sept. 26. The event is free and open to the public (first-come first-served tickets are available here) and will also be streamed online at neh.gov. (7/26) | More
The Center for Advanced Study in the Visual Arts at the National Gallery of Art (The Center) announced the multi-talented Anna Deavere Smith will will give the 73rd A. W. Mellon Lectures in the Fine Arts in spring 2024. Smith is an award-winning actress, playwright, author, and University Professor at the Tisch School of the Arts at New York University. She will give the free, four-part lecture series in the museum’s East Building Auditorium every Sunday from April 28 to May 19, 2024. (7/31)| More
CT
