Date: Fri 24-Sep-1999

Publication: Ant

Author: CAROLL

Quick Words:

Addison-Legacy

Full Text:

To Conserve A Legacy: American Art From Historically Black Colleges And

Universities

(with 4 cuts)

ANDOVER, MASS. -- "To Conserve a Legacy: American Art from Historically Black

Colleges and Universities," organized by the Addison Gallery of American Art

and The Studio Museum in Harlem, is a major consortium project that

encompasses a touring exhibition, a conservation training program for minority

students, conservation of the work included in the exhibition, and a scholarly

catalogue. The exhibition premiered at The Studio Museum in Harlem in March,

followed by the only New England presentation at the Addison Gallery of

American Art, through October 31.

Adam D. Weinberg, director, the Addison Gallery of American Art, stated, "This

important project represents an enormous effort to build awareness of the

impact of African-American art on American culture and society as well as

highlights the need to preserve this rich legacy for generations to come."

The historically black universities participating in the consortium are: Clark

Atlanta University, Fisk University, Hampton University, Howard University,

North Carolina Central University, and Tuskegee University. Following its

presentation at the Addison Gallery, the exhibition will travel to five of the

historically black universities, where it will be co-presented with leading

institutions in the same city, as well as the Art Institute of Chicago.

Many of this nation's HBCUs hold significant collections of American art and

have founded galleries and museums on their campuses. "To Conserve a Legacy"

features more than 250 important works of art drawn from the collection of six

historically black colleges and universities (HBCUs). These collections

provide a rich resource for the study of Nineteenth and Twentieth Century

American art, with a special emphasis on African-American art. The exhibition

places this work within a comprehensive historical context and stylistic range

of American art and culture and highlights the need for preservation of this

important resource.

The six participating HBCU collections represent magnificent holdings of

American art, including works by Josef Albers, Romare Bearden, John Biggers,

Elizabeth Catlett, Roy DeCarava, Aaron Douglas, Charles Demuth, Arthur Dove,

Sam Gilliam, Marsden Hartley, William H. Johnson, Jacob Lawrence, Edmonia

Lewis, Georgia O'Keeffe, Horace Pippin, Alfred Steiglitz, Henry O. Tanner,

Thomas Waterman, Charles White, Hale Woodruff, and Boston area artists Allan

Rohan Crite and John Wilson.

The exhibition is curated by Dr Richard J. Powell, chair, Department of Art

and Art History, Duke University, and Jock Reynolds, director, Yale University

Art Gallery, formerly director of the Addison Gallery of American Art.

The exhibition is divided into six sections, each exploring a major theme

concerning history, legacy, and conservation -- "Forever Free: Emancipation

Visualized," "The First Americans," "Training the Head, the Hand, and the

Heart," "The American Portrait Gallery," "American Expressionism," and "Modern

Lives, Modern Impulses."

"Forever Free: Emancipation Visualized" explores the visual expressions and

optimism of the last quarter of the Nineteenth Century. Works from this

section include Henry O. Tanner's "Poplars" from the North Carolina Central

University Art Museum and Charles Demuth's "Calla Lilies" from Fisk University

Art Galleries, and explores both literal and abstract expressions of freedom.

Many of the works from "The First Americans" section, including selections

such as Francis Chickering Briggs' "Dakota Album" and Leigh Richmond Miner's

"The Young Chief," both from the Hampton University Museum, demonstrate how

people were thinking about what it means to be American in the broadest

possible sense at this time.

In "Training the Head, the Hand, and the Heart," the lessons envisioned and

initiated by Booker T. Washington are exemplified in the anonymous photograph

of William J. Edwards and the teachers at Snow Hill Institute from the

collection of Tuskegee University, as well as works such as Jacob Lawrence's

"Palm Sunday" from the N.C.C.U. Art Museum.

"The American Portrait Gallery" looks at the voice and presence that the

visual arts gave to the black American community in the early part of this

century. Works in this section, from Arthur Bedou's photographs of Booker T.

Washington from the collection of Tuskegee University, to Charles White's

"Progress of the American Negro" from the Howard University Gallery of Art,

show real people coming into their own.

"American Expressionism" traces the development of an unexplored movement in

American art which mirrors the German Expressionist movement, and, similarly,

uses visual distortion to evoke the inner portrait of the subject. The works

in this section explore lynchings and segregation, using art to create a new

expressionistic vision of this era, and include Barnarn's sculpture "Day Work"

and Otis Galbreath's "Let By Gones Be By Gones," both from the Clark Atlanta

University Art Gallery.

"Modern Lives, Modern Impulses" looks at how the HBCUs and African-American

artists were moving into a new way of thinking and living in the mid-Twentieth

Century, as exemplified by Archibald Motley's "Carnival" from the Howard

University Gallery of Art and Arthur Dove's "Swinging in the Park," from Fisk

University Art Galleries.

Following its presentation at the Addison Gallery of American Art, "To

Conserve a Legacy" will travel to Howard University Gallery of Art with the

Corcoran Gallery of Art; the Art Institute of Chicago; Clark Atlanta

University Art Collections with the High Museum of Art; North Carolina Central

University Art Museum with Duke University Museum of Art and the Center for

Documentary Studies, Duke University; Fisk University Art Galleries with the

Tennessee State Museum; and the Hampton University Art Museum with the

Chrysler Museum.

A fully illustrated catalogue, documenting each component of the project, will

be published by the Addison Gallery of American Art and the Studio Museum in

Harlem and distributed by MIT Press.

The Addison Gallery of American Art has one of the most important collections

of American art in the country. With the gift of financier and alumnus Thomas

Cochran, the museum opened to the public in 1931. Assembled with the

assistance of major collectors and dealers of the period, the collection began

with major works by the most prominent American artists -- among them, Stuart,

Copley, West, Eakins, Homer, Whistler, Sargent, Hassam, Twachtman, Thayer,

Davies, Sloan, and Prendergast. In the ensuing 66 years, aggressive purchasing

and generous gifts in all media have added works by such artists as Calder,

Moholy-Nagy, Hofmann, Lawrence, O'Keeffe, Stella ('54), Ryman, Mangold,

Marden, Lewitt, as well as comprehensive photographic holdings representing,

among others, Eadward Muybridge, Walker Evans ('24), Berenice Abbott, Robert

Frank, Hollis Frampton ('53), and William Eggleston.

The Addison Gallery will offer public and educational programs in conjunction

with the exhibition. For more information, call 978/749-4017.