I am watching a black man gyrate in front of me in a thong over gray briefs. A tuft of synthetic, orange hair peeks out from the front of the triangular fabric. His nearly-shaven head glistens as beads of sweat trickle down his face. His dark eyes stare intensely at us.
Starting with the landmark Plessy v Ferguson case of 1896 and continuing until the 2009 inauguration of the first US President with African heritage, the Smithsonian has launched Oh Freedom! Teaching African American Civil Rights through American Art at the Smithsonian. But why so few women and where are the LGBT people?
Heroic Africans: Legendary Leaders, Iconic Sculpture opened at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City this September with a display of 100 masterpieces borrowed from collections outside of Africa. At face value I thought the exhibition title sounded like an attempt ingratiate African art objects in to a positive and inspirational realm. This, along with the earthy brown color of the exhibition signage, felt clichéd. However I vowed to maintain an open mind as dealing with Africa as a continent loaded with colonial history, really creates a “damned if you do damned if you don’t” scenario for many curators.
The Museum of Contemporary African Diasporan Art has launched a new half-hour program, MoCADA TV, on Brooklyn’s BCAT TV network, an arts-focused public channel.
Recently I had the opportunity to speak with photographer Timothy Greenfield-Sanders about The Black List: Volume III, his increasingly popular documentary series on the African American It-list, which premiered February 8, 2010, on HBO.
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