Author: Camara Dia Holloway

I am the Project Manager for the Romare Bearden Digital Catalogue Raisonné at the Wildenstein Plattner Institute. I earned my PhD at Yale University in the History of Art Department and specialize in twentieth century American art with a particular focus on the history of photography, race and representation, and transatlantic modernist networks. I also serve as a Founding Co-Director of the Association for Critical Race Art History (ACRAH).

EXH: “Romare Bearden: The Artist as Activist” @ The Nathan Cummings Foundation [NYC]

An exhibition organized by the Romare Bearden Foundation

Romare Bearden: The Artist as Activist examines how an American artist agitated for change through the power of his art and writing. This show traces Bearden’s evolution into a true master artist whose work changed our ways of seeing the world and thus our readiness for action in it. On display will be original works as well as examples of his magazine covers and editorial cartoons.

Curated by Diedra Harris-Kelley, C. Daniel Dawson and Robert G. O’Meally

This exhibition is on view from April 28, 2011–July 22, 2011

at the Nathan Cummings Foundation.

The Nathan Cummings Foundation

475 10th Avenue, 14th Floor

New York, NY 10018

 

Opening Reception

Thursday, April 28, 6:00pm–8:00pm

Live music and refreshments

RSVP by April 22 at ncf.events@nathancummings.org

 

Viewing Hours

9:00am-5:00pm, Monday through Friday, by appointment only.

Please contact Arnita Morabito at 212-787-7300, Ext. 206.

SYMP: Nka Roundtable III: “Contemporary African Art and the Museum”

Nka Roundtable III: “Contemporary African Art and the Museum”

Over the next several weeks curators and directors of major museums in the United States, Germany, Japan, South Africa and the UK will engage in spirited but substantial discussion on the relationship between contemporary African art and the museum. I expect excursions into the history of this relationship, its crucial moments, state of affairs, and challenges that remain. In the process, we shall debate issues of presenting this material in art and ethnology museums; the politics of acquisitions and display; museums and scholarship; and the place of contemporary African art–relative to the “traditional” and western contemporary. I suspect that there will be surprising turns in the course of our discussion, but I am certain that the deliberations of this diverse, unprecedented and distinguished panel of curators will surely be of immense value to students and scholars working or interested in this exciting, dynamic field. Please join us!

Convener: *Chika Okeke-Agulu* (Princeton University)

Participants: *Marla Berns* (Director, Fowler Museum of Cultural History, University of California, Los Angeles), *Christa Clarke* (Senior Curator, Newark Museum, Newark, NJ), *Laurie Ann Farrell* (Director of Exhibitions, Savannah College of Art & Design Gallery, Savannah, GA), *Khwezi Gule* (Chief Curator, Hector Pieterson Memorial, Johannesburg), *Kinsey Katchka* (independent scholar/curator), *Yukiya Kawaguchi* (Associate Professor, National Museum of Ethnology, Osaka), *Clive Kellner* (Curator-at-Large, The Gordon Schachat Collection, Johannesburg), *Karen Milbourne* (Curator, Smithsonian National Museum for African Art, Washington DC), *Raison Naidoo* (Director Arts Collections, Iziko: South African National Gallery, Cape Town), *Enid Schildkrout* (Chief Curator/Director of Exhibitions, Museum for African Art, New York) *Chris Spring* (Curator, British Museum, London), *Ulf Vierke* (Director, Iwalewa-Haus, University of Bayreuth, Bayreuth), *Okwui Enwezor*, *Salah M. Hassan*.

http://nkajournal.wordpress.com/

CFP: Session at Southeastern College Art Conference @ Savannah, GA

“African Diaspora Artists in the Americas: New Histories, New Constructions, New Interpretations”

This session will focus on new research addressing art created by African Diaspora artists in the Americas from the colonial eras to the present.  In the last two decades, scholars have both expanded the field of study of African American and African Diasporic art and developed newly nuanced interpretations of the meanings and implications of racialized discourses about artistic production and stylistic interchange.  This sessions seeks papers addressing issues raised by these new discursive constructions related to relationships between artists, social politics, and contemporary visual culture; the significance of trans-Atlantic or trans-Pacific artistic and cultural interchange; the intersections of gender and class with racialized identities; post-colonial approaches to the history and effects of slavery; and challenges to the notion of race itself as an organizing category of knowledge.  Papers that address any aspect of these dimensions of the history of African American or African Diasporic Art in the Americas are welcomed.

Please submit a 200-word (maximum) proposal using the form found on the SECAC website plus a 1 page CV by April 20, 2011 to session Chair: Helen Langa, e-mail: hlanga@american.edu (see address and phone below)

http://www.secollegeart.org/forms/2011_SECAC_Call_for_Papers_PROPOSAL_FORM.doc

For more information about the conference and SECAC, see: http://www.secollegeart.org/annual-conference.html

Helen Langa, PhD
Director, Art History Program
Associate Professor, Art History and Gender Studies
Katzen Art Center 233
Art Department
American University
4400 Massachusetts Ave. NW
Washington D.C. 20016-8004
hlanga@american.edu
202-885-1682

SYMP: African Art Symposium in Honor of Dr. Sidney L. Kasfir @ Emory

Critical Encounters: A Graduate Student Symposium in Honor of Sidney Littlefield Kasfir

Friday & Saturday
April 22 & 23, 2011
Michael C. Carlos Museum
Emory University
Reception Hall
Throughout her career Dr. Sidney L. Kasfir has sought to rethink the way scholars, artists, museums, and viewers understand and categorize African art. She has attempted to expand our classificatory system without allowing generalizations to dilute the complex efforts of artists, cultures, and visual languages. This symposium, organized in honor of her retirement from Emory University, considers three themes to which Dr. Kasfir has contributed: Commodification and Tourism; Heritage; and The Artist, The Workshop, and Cultural Brokerage.

Invited graduate students from across the country, in multiple disciplines working with visual culture in Africa, will explore topics related to these themes in a day-long symposium that is open to the Emory community and the public.

This program is co-sponsored by Emory University’s Michael C. Carlos Museum, Art History Department, and Institute for African Studies.
Friday, April 22
7:30 pm
Keynote Address
Dr. Chika Okeke-Agulu, Assistant Professor of Art History, Princeton University, New Thoughts on the Mbari Mbayo Workshops in Osogbo, 1962-66

Continue reading “SYMP: African Art Symposium in Honor of Dr. Sidney L. Kasfir @ Emory”

EXH: “Richmond Barthé: The Seeker” and Gallery Talk @ Ohr-O’Keefe Museum of Art

Richmond Barthé: The Seeker
November 6, 2010 – June 12, 2011

Gallery of African American Art
Beau Rivage Resort & Casino Gallery

Guest Curator: Margaret Rose Vendryes

Richmond Barthé, who was born on the Mississippi Gulf Coast, began his career in 1927 during his training at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. Barthé initially studied painting, but after he was exposed to modeling the human form in clay, he found his calling and began to attain success as a sculptor. After his move to New York, where he was associated with the Harlem Renaissance, Barthé established a reputation as one of the leading modern artists of his time, as well as one of the first African American artists to obtain critical success and celebrity.

Gallery Talk and Reception

Saturday, April 16
6:00 p.m. – 8:00 p.m.

Guest Curator, Margaret Rose Vendryes, Ph.D. will speak on the highlights of bronze sculptor, Richmond Barthé’s life and career.  She will also be available to sign her book Barthé a Life in Sculpture which is available for purchase in the Museum Store.

The event is Free for members
$5 for non-members

www.georgeohr.org

386 Beach Boulevard · Biloxi · Mississippi  · 39530 · 228.374.5547

PUB: Doctored: The Medicine of Photography in Nineteenth-Century America by Tanya Sheenan

“Doctored: The Medicine of Photography in Nineteenth-Century America,” by Tanya Sheenan was released last week from Penn State University Press.

http://www.psupress.org/books/titles/978-0-271-03792-9.html

http://www.amazon.com/Doctored-Medicine-Photography-Nineteenth-Century-America/dp/027103792X/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1301967393&sr=1-1

In Doctored, Tanya Sheehan takes a new look at the relationship between
photography and medicine in American culture, from the nineteenth century
to the present. Sheehan focuses on Civil War and postbellum Philadelphia,
exploring the ways in which medical models and metaphors helped strengthen
the professional legitimacy of the city’s commercial photographic
community at a time when it was not well established. By reading the trade
literature and material practices of portrait photography and medicine in
relation to one another, she shows how their interaction defined the space
of the urban portrait studio as well as the physical and social effects of
studio operations. Integrating the methods of social art history, science
studies, and media studies, Doctored reveals important connections between
the professionalization of American photographers and the construction of
photography’s cultural identity.

Continue reading “PUB: Doctored: The Medicine of Photography in Nineteenth-Century America by Tanya Sheenan”

EXH: “Reframing Haiti: Art, History and Performativity” @ Brown University, et al.

From March 23-April 21, 2011, Brown University, in collaboration with the Rhode Island School of Design and the Waterloo Center for the Arts, will host a multi-venue exhibition of more than 100 works of Haitian art.

In conjunction with this exhibition, titled, Re-Framing Haiti: Art, History and Performativity, Brown will host five visiting Haitian artists, who will present public lectures and workshops.

The exhibition and all artist events will be free and open to the public.

http://brown.edu/web/reframing-haiti/

 

Contact: reframinghaiti@gmail.com

401-863-3137

OPP: Archaeological Field School on Edgefield, South Carolina Pottery Communities

Archaeological Field School on Edgefield, South Carolina Pottery Communities
University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign
Anth. 454-CF and 455-CF (6 credits; 6 weeks), May 23, 2011 to July 1, 2011

This field school will provide training in the techniques of excavation, mapping, controlled surface surveys, artifact classification and contextual interpretation. Students will work in supervised teams, learning to function as members of a field crew, with all of the skills necessary for becoming professional archaeologists. Many students from past University of Illinois field schools have gone on to graduate study and professional field-archaeology positions. Laboratory processing and analysis will be ongoing during the field season. Evening lectures by project staff, visiting archaeologists, and historians will focus on providing background on how field data are used to answer archaeological and historical research questions.

Learn more on our web site —
http://www.histarch.uiuc.edu/Edgefield/

Continue reading “OPP: Archaeological Field School on Edgefield, South Carolina Pottery Communities”

EXH: “Moments of Beauty” @ The Centre for Contemporary Art, Lagos

The Centre for Contemporary Art, Lagos
J. D. ‘Okhai Ojeikere
Moments of Beauty
15 April– 27 November 2011

ARS 11
Museum of Contemporary Art, Kiasma
Helsinki, Finland

The Centre for Contemporary Art, Lagos presents Moments of Beauty, a groundbreaking exhibition of work by the Nigerian artist J.D. ‘Okhai Ojeikere. Occasionally elegiac, but invariably elegant, the photographs in this exhibition reflect what the artist deems as “moments of beauty,” referring to the ebullience of Nigerian life engendered by independence and decolonisation. The exhibition highlights the breadth and depth of Ojeikere’s practice, chronicling his experiences as a visual artist and commercial photographer by presenting works that cover a range of subjects including architecture, education, fashion, social life and cultural festivals. This first comprehensive survey of Ojeikere’s work to date, with over 150 works, marks the beginning of rigorous scholarship and engagement with the artist’s practice, which spans more than half of a century. As such Moments of Beauty provides in-depth perspectives to the practice of an artist whose formidable archive has become an important anthropological, ethnographic, and artistic treasure.

J.D. ‘Okhai Ojeikere (b. 1930) documented significant moments in Nigerian history with great passion and discernment. Throughout his career, he has focused on the social, political and cultural transformations occurring during Nigeria’s transition from a colonial state to an independent republic. His formal investigations, documentary work and various commercial endeavors captured the unique atmosphere and élan of Nigeria during a period of great euphoria and ambivalence. Practicing since the early 1950’s, Ojeikere is a leading artist of his generation, devoted to the art of image making, the history of his country and the critical possibilities of the photographic medium.

Moments of Beauty is curated by Aura Seikkula and Bisi Silva. Curatorial Assistant is Antawan I. Byrd.

This exhibition has been organised by the Centre for Contemporary Art, Lagos in collaboration with Foto Ojeikere. It is co-produced with theMuseum of Contemporary Art, Kiasma as an independently curated part of the ARS 11 exhibition, Helsinki, Finland. ARS 11 is curated by Pirkko Siitari, Arja Miller and Jari-Pekka Vanhala from Kiasma.

A substantial monograph of Ojeikere’s life and work is currently in production and being co-ordinated by CCA, Lagos. The richly illustrated exhibition catalogue of ARS 11 includes an insightful essay on Ojeikere’s practice by Aura Seikkula and Bisi Silva.

Taking “Africa” as its focal point, this year’s edition of ARS 11, Finland’s largest international exhibition of contemporary art will feature work by approximately thirty artists whose practices engage with Africa from various perspectives. Among the participating artists are Georges Adéagbo, El Anatsui, Samba Fall, Laura Horelli, Alfredo Jaar, Nandipha Mntambo, Otobong Nkanga, Odili Odita, Emeka Ogboh, Abraham Oghobaseand Barthélémy Toguo.

For inquiries, please contact info@ccalagos.org or info@kiasma.fi
Antawan I. Byrd
Curatorial Assistant
Centre for Contemporary Art, Lagos
Lagos, Nigeria
antawan@ccalagos.org

JOB: Curatorial Fellowship @ Indianapolis Museum of Art

Weisenberger Fellow of American Art

The Indianapolis Museum of Art is pleased to announce an 8-month graduate curatorial fellowship. The Weisenberger Fellowship provides curatorial training in American art and supports scholarly research of the IMA collection of American painting and sculpture from 1800 to 1945. The Weisenberger Fellow is fully integrated into the museum’s curatorial division and has responsibilities in collection management and preparation of interpretive materials.

The Weisenberger Fellow will receive a stipend of $16,000 plus benefits, and housing on the museum campus is provided. The 8-month fellowship period will begin in October 2011.

To be eligible for the fellowship, the applicant must hold a Master’s degree in art history or a related field. Applicants must demonstrate scholarly excellence as well as a strong interest in the museum profession. Applications should include a cover letter explaining your interest in the fellowship, a curriculum vitae, a writing sample, and 3 letters of recommendation. Applications must be received by May 15, 2011.

Application materials may be emailed to hr@imamuseum.org or mailed to:

Indianapolis Museum of Art

Attn: Human Resources

4000 Michigan Road

Indianapolis, IN 46208-3326