Culture
Kennedy Museum of Art worked with community members to organize ‘Centering Black Artists’
By: Payton Szymczak
Posted on:
ATHENS, Ohio (WOUB) – A group of Athens community members organized the “Centering Black Artists” exhibition at the Kennedy Museum of Art (100 Ridges Circle), and it resulted in being more than just an art display.
“We’re centering conversations about marginalized communities in a way that’s genuine,” said Dayna Shoulders, the Ohio University Student Senate President.
Shoulders is an advocate for diversity, and has always taken an interest in art. Her excitement for the community building following the exhibition has only inspired her more.
“I think the museum has done a really good job of bringing our community in,” Shoulders said. “One of the opportunities there was, was how do we continue the conversations about diversity and art.”
One of Shoulders’ tasks was to ensure that the exhibition was authentic and that the Black community on campus would feel welcomed by it.
“They really wanted it to seem like something that people were going to welcome,” Shoulders said. “They didn’t want to do anything that was going to make our Black community on campus feel like it was inauthentic.”
A focus of the exhibition’s team was to highlight Black women artists. Shoulders said she enjoyed helping to choose the artwork included.
“That last week in February is that intersection between Black History Month and Women’s History Month,” Shoulders said. “I just thought it would be a very great opportunity to kind of have that talk of intersectionality at that time.”
“Art is similar in the way that it reflects life,” Shoulders said. “Life often reflects the art. I’m really excited about that part.”
A lot of research and preparation took place months in advance before the showcasing. The museum has always incorporated the involvement of students in the development of exhibitions.
The Kennedy Museum of Art Registrar, Lisa Quinn, said the engagement of students has increased in recent years.
“I think that when we’re working with students in general, that’s another thing they bring to the table,” Quinn said.“They bring a freshness, they bring in new ideas, and suggest ways of seeing that maybe we haven’t incorporated before.”
Quinn said that the goal of the museum is to be a teaching tool for university students.
“It is something that we think about a lot,” Quinn said. “We would like to make sure that we are showing a good representation of people in the museum.”
Quinn said they were not dealing with artists for this exhibition, but they were dealing with people within the university and community members. She said it was a different vision being expressed.
“I personally have not done that before, where we work with a committee outside of the museum to make suggestions on how the exhibition comes together,” Quinn said. “It was a lot of fun and interesting, and makes you aware of how other people see and want to see exhibitions.”
Artwork is not the only thing on display. A majority of the artists presented have a QR code linked to a video discussing their work.
“Our goal was to find a video of every single one of these artists if possible, and we did for almost all of them,” Quinn said. “You hear them talking about their artwork in their own voice, and you hear them talking about their life and their struggles and how some of them are very similar and some of them are very different.”
Visitors are welcomed to explore the exhibition any day of the week. The exhibition will be on display until the summer.
For more information about the exhibition, visit https://www.ohio.edu/museum/centeringblackartists.
For more information about the Kennedy Museum of Art, visit https://www.ohio.edu/museum.