Published on 12 December 2010 by JClowe in Current Exhibitions

November 13, 2010 through January 31, 2011 in the Museum Library
(open Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Saturdays, from 1 to 4 p.m.)
Norman Rockwell Museum 9 Route 183 Stockbridge, MA 01262 413-298-4100 x 221

“I guess that my philosophical approach to life is that I am fascinated with the human individual and his complicated environment. . . ”
—Norman Rockwell, 1967

Norman Rockwell’s first work for Look magazine was published in early 1964. A dramatic two-page spread of a young girl desegregating an all-white school, The Problem We All Live With acknowledged the ten years that had passed since the United States Supreme Court outlawed segregation in public schools. Rockwell drew inspiration from the experience of Ruby Bridges, whose November 14, 1960 entrance into the Williams Frantz Public School was met with racist jeers and picket signs. His poignant piece was a departure from the idealized narratives he had become known for, and it was only his first of many illustrations motivated by real-world concerns.

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Ongoing Exhibition

This long-term exhibition serves as the central experience of the museum. The 22,000 square-foot exhibition space contains more than 20 galleries that allow patrons to travel over time and across geographic boundaries.

The journey begins in prehistoric Africa, the cradle of human life. Witness several ancient and early modern civilizations that evolved on the continent. Cross the Atlantic Ocean, experience the tragedy of the middle passage and encounter those who resisted the horrors of bondage, emancipated themselves and sometimes took flight by way of the Underground Railroad. Throughout this trip, the efforts of everyday men and women who built families, businesses, educational institutions, spiritual traditions, civic organizations and a legacy of freedom and justice in past and present-day Detroit are hailed. What an awesome journey!

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The NCCU Department of Art offers students the opportunity to earn their Bachelor of Art degree in Art. Students may choose to concentrate in Visual Communications, Studio, Art Education, or General Art Studies.

Each concentration provides challenging instruction in an intellectually stimulating environment where students become informed and well-rounded artist, designers, and teachers. In their first year all students must complete six foundation courses that are prerequisites for all upper level coursework.

The Art Department sponsors a number of free public events a year, ranging from student and faculty exhibitions in collaboration with the NCCU museum of Art, panel discussions, workshops and symposiums. Every year, there is a full array of art activities. All the artistic media taught in the Art Department are represented. Art faculty, staff, students, and alumni often give lectures or exhibit their work locally, regionally and internationally. This page will bring such information as frequently as possible.

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Naomi Sims: March 30, 1948 – Aug. 1 — Sims is widely credited as being the first African American supermodel. Her key breakthrough came when she was selected for a national television campaign for AT&T, which showed her and two other models — one white and one Asian — wearing fashions by Bill Blass. After modeling, she expanded into a multimillion-dollar beauty empire and at least five book on modeling and beauty. She died of cancer.

By al benson

“IndiVisible: African-Native American Lives in the Americas,” a Smithsonian Institution traveling display focusing on African-Native American people, will be exhibited at the Schingoethe Center for Native American Cultures at Aurora University from Dec. 17 to Feb. 27.

The 20-panel exhibit, part of the museum’s 20th anniversary celebration, is free to the public at the center in Dunham Hall at 1400 Marseillaise Place in Aurora.

Hours are 8 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Monday, Wednesday, Thursday and Friday; 8 a.m. to 6:30 p.m. Tuesday and 1 to 4 p.m. Sunday. Free parking is available adjacent to Dunham Hall.

A reception for “IndiVisible” will be held from 4:30 to 6:30 p.m. Jan. 13 at the center. The public is invited. Call (630) 844-7843.

‘We are so pleased to be able to bring this exhibit to our campus and our community to shed light on an area of Native and African American studies that is not known to most Americans,” said Meg Bero, Schingoethe Center executive director,

The exhibit was produced by the National Museum of the American Indian in collaboration with the National Museum of African American History and Culture and the Smithsonian Institution Traveling Exhibition Service.

Generous support came from Akaloa Resource Foundation and the Latino Initiatives Pool, administered by the Smithsonian Latino Center.

Through the themes of policy, community, creative resistance and lifestyles, the display includes stories of cultural integration and the struggle to define and preserve identity.

The daily cultural practices that define the African-Native American experience through food, language, writing, music, dance and the visual arts, are also highlighted.

The exhibition was curated by leading scholars, educators, and community leaders. The display addresses the racially motivated laws that have been forced upon Native, African American and mixed-heritage peoples since the time of Christopher Columbus.

Since precolonial times, Native and African American peoples have built strong communities through intermarriage, unified efforts to preserve their land and by taking part in creative resistance.

These communities developed constructive survival strategies over time, and several have regained economic sustainability through gaming in the 1980s.

A 10-minute media piece is featured with interviews obtained during research and work on the exhibition with tribal communities across North America.

The museum’s 20th anniversary celebration continues Feb. 8 at 6:30 p.m. with the lecture “Black, Red and Deadly: The Cherokee Frontier Police of the Indian Territory Cherokee Slave Revolt of 1842” by author Art Burton.

The museum opened in 1990 as a place to display some of the 6,000 artifacts donated by collectors Herb and Martha Schingoethe.

The late Aurora couple also funded the construction of Dunham Hall and the museum on its lower level.

Call (630) 844-7843, e-mail museum@aurora.edu or visit aurora.edu/museum.
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Khalil Gibran Muhammad, a history professor at Indiana University, has been named the new director of the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, to begin in July 2011. New York Public Library officials made the announcement on Wednesday, ending a sometimes contentious search.

Dr. Muhammad, 38, succeeds Howard Dodson Jr., who last April announced his plans to retire after leading the Schomburg, a research unit of the library, since 1984. Under Mr. Dodson’s leadership, the Schomburg’s holdings of artifacts related to the global black experience went to 10 million items from 5 million. Mostly recently, the center acquired the papers of Maya Angelou, a collection that was added to treasures like a rare recording of a Marcus Garvey speech and documents signed by Toussaint L’Ouverture. Under Mr. Dodson, attendance at the Schomburg, at 515 Lenox Avenue, at 135th Street in Harlem, tripled to about 120,000 people annually.

In Dr. Muhammad, a Chicago native, the library has chosen a scholar with an interest in race relations to face one of the biggest challenges confronting all libraries in the Internet age: getting materials online while luring people away from their computers and into library buildings.

Dr. Muhammad, who has been at Indiana University since 2005, is the author of “The Condemnation of Blackness: “Race, Crime, and the Making of Modern Urban America” (Harvard University Press, 2010), a well-received exploration of how notions of black criminality were crucial to the creation of modern urban centers. On his Indiana University Web site, Dr. Muhammad lists his research interests as including the racial politics of criminal law, policing, juvenile delinquency and punishment, as well as immigration and social reform.

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Ernest “Ernie” Eugene Barnes, Jr. (July 15, 1938 – April 27, 2009) is considered one of the leading African-American painters and is well-known for his unique style of elongation and movement. He was also a former professional football player, actor and author.

Ernest Barnes, Jr. was born during the Jim Crow era in “the bottom” community of Durham, North Carolina. His father, Ernest E. Barnes, Sr. (1900 – 1966) worked as a shipping clerk for Liggett Myers Tobacco Company. His mother, Fannie Mae Geer (1905 – 2004) oversaw the household staff for prominent attorney Frank Fuller, Jr.

On days when Fannie allowed “June” (Barnes’ nickname to his family and childhood friends) to accompany her to work, Barnes had the opportunity to peruse the art books and listen to the classical music in Fuller’s study. The young Ernest was intrigued and captivated by the works of master artists. By the time Barnes entered the first grade, he was familiar with the works of such masters as Toulouse-Lautrec, Delacroix, Rubens, and Michelangelo. When he entered junior high, he could appreciate, as well as decode, many of the cherished masterpieces within the walls of mainstream museums – although it would be a half dozen more years before he was allowed entrance because of his race.

A self-described chubby and unathletic child, Barnes was taunted and bullied by classmates. He continually sought refuge in his sketchbooks, hiding in the less-traveled parts of school away from the other students. He was caught one day in a quiet area by Tommy Tucker, the masonry teacher who was also the weightlifting coach and a former athlete. Tucker was intrigued with Barnes’ drawings. He asked the aspiring artist about his grades and goals. Tucker shared his own experience of how bodybuilding improved his strength and outlook on life. That one encounter would instill in Barnes discipline and dedication that would permeate his life. In his senior year at Hillside High School, Barnes became the captain of the football team and state champion in the shot put and discus throw.

In 1956 Barnes graduated from high school with 26 athletic scholarship offers. Because of segregation, he was prevented from considering nearby Duke or the University of North Carolina. His mother promised him a car if he lived at home and attended the all-Black North Carolina College (now North Carolina Central University) which was then located across the street from his high school. He enrolled there on a full athletic scholarship and majored in art. His track coach was Dr. Leroy T. Walker. Barnes played the football positions of tackle and center at NCC, and was selected to the All-Conference team.

At age 18, on a college art class field trip to the newly-desegregated North Carolina Museum of Art, Barnes inquired where he could find “paintings by Negro artists.” The docent responded, “Your people don’t express themselves that way.” Poetic justice prevailed 22 years later in 1978 when Barnes returned to the museum for a solo exhibition, hosted by North Carolina Governor James Hunt.

In 1990 Barnes was awarded an Honorary Doctorate of Fine Arts by North Carolina Central University.

In 1993 Barnes was selected to the Black College Football 100th Year All-Time Team by the Sheridan Broadcasting Network.

In 1999 Barnes was bestowed The University Award, the highest honor by The University of North Carolina Board of Governors.

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