Opinion
Cindy Sherman in Blackface
Here we go again. #Myhsa (aka @E_SCRAAATCH) has called attention to artist Cindy Sherman’s blackface performance in some rarely seen works from 1976 by using the tag #cindygate.
African American
Art
The Living History of Jacob Lawrence's 'Migration Series'
I am only one generation removed from the history of African American migrants who, between 1917 and 1970, travelled North seeking economic opportunity, education, and respite from the strictures of Jim Crow South.
Art
As the Met Abandons Blackface, a Look at the Legacy of African Americans in Opera
Inevitably, the history of Black American opera chronicles not just perseverance and accomplishment, but also racism and exclusion.
Art
Remembering Sandra Bland in Thailand
CHIANG MAI, Thailand — When I first heard about Sandra Bland I was in the Seoul airport, en route to Thailand where I would begin my journey across Southeast Asia and beyond.
Art
Jean-Michel Basquiat and the Immortal Black Life
Often, I consider what people will make of my notebooks after I am dead.
Art
Hale Woodruff's Vibrant Murals Immortalize African-American History
If you've seen Steven Spielberg’s movie Amistad, you already know this story: in 1838, a 25-year-old enslaved Mendeian named Cinque led a successful revolt aboard the Spanish slave ship La Amistad.
Art
Funk, Medicine, and Questions of the Future
In performance, as in history, there’s a lot that gets lost: layers of meaning and nuance too complex to carry in a single story. Investigating Simone Leigh's and Xenobia Bailey’s projects for funkgodjazz&medicine: Black Radical Brooklyn, produced by Creative Time and the Weeksville Heritage Center,
Art
Rediscovering the Roots of Black Radical Brooklyn
The energetic, jumbled print design of funkgodjazz&medicine: Black Radical Brooklyn, an exhibition by Creative Time and the Weeksville Heritage Center, strikes a bright, funkedelic chord in the mind’s eye. This is jazz; this is the casting off of the master’s linguistic tools; this is a celebration
Opinion
MoMA Hires Consulting Curator for Black Art
The appointment raises questions about the way museums treat black artists and their work, which in turn expose the complications of turning a race into an artistic category.
Art
Carrie Mae Weems Brings Change to the Guggenheim
This year, Carrie Mae Weems gets the distinctive honor of becoming the first African-American woman to have a retrospective at the Guggenheim — her first major exhibition at any New York museum, ever. It’s one of those honors that sits at an awkward intersection, both disappointing and profound.
Art
Animating the Archive: Black Performance Art's Radical Presence
Radical Presence gives a great taste of some of the work done by black artists working in performance over the past five decades. And one of the best things about it is that it’s not just a static archive.
Opinion
The Awkward Laughing Moment of Charles Ramsey's Hero Tale
CHICAGO — The latest internet fodder for comment threads and message boards is Charles Ramsey, a man who helped rescue three Cleveland women who were thought dead more than a decade ago. Providing quotes to the pageview-hungry internet media ("I was eatin' my McDonald's.") and others like that have