John Woodrow Wilson was a sculptor, painter, printmaker, and educator from Roxbury, MA. Trabajador is a black-and-white depiction of a Black bricklayer working at a construction site. The bricklayer is wearing a ten-gallon hat and overalls and holding bricks as he uses a trowel. There are steel beams in the background.
Charles White was a Black draftsman, printmaker, and painter who illustrated the Southern Black struggle. To the Future shows a Black woman standing cross-armed in front of hills and barren trees; she is scaled more significantly than the landscape. It speaks to African Americans being bigger than their past and a tradition of looking forward.
Norma Morgan was a painter from New Haven, Connecticut. Tired Traveler depicts a human figure tilting forward with their arms swinging outward. The figure is in the center of a dark landscape of an ocean shore.
William S. Carter was an abstract, landscape, still-life, and figurative painter from St. Louis, Missouri. Three Women (figures) depicts three nude women drawn over muted watercolors. The women maintain a confident pose that separates them from their abstract background.
Hale Aspacio Woodruff was an artist and art educator known for his murals, paintings, and prints from Cairo, IL. The Yellow Bird is a cubist depiction of a yellow bird perched on a Black girl’s hand. The girl wears a blue dress with multicolored ribbons hanging from her hair.
Estella W. Johnson was an artist from New York, NY. The Way of the Flesh is a cultic depiction of a cloaked figure ascending a stairwell. The figure cloaked in white has another black cloaked figure attached to it as they pass a line of cloaked figures with bowed heads.
Donald H. Roberts was a painter, photographer, architecture professor, and U.S. Army Vet from Washington, D.C. The Uninvited depicts a technofuture centering a humanoid machine. The humanoid machine is looking toward a keyhole with refracted images surrounded by a dark void.
Eva Booker was an artist from Atlanta, GA. The Road we Trod depicts Black American experiences with white supremacy during the Civil Rights Movement. The peace critiques the KKK, lynching, lunch counter discrimination, education inequality, job orientation, religious hypocrisy and Black people's long march toward freedom in spite of.
Harold Lloyd Neal was an artist from Detroit, MI. The Red Robe is a portrait of a woman with a red robe hanging off her shoulders. The subject's breasts are visible as she poses, legs crossed, looking away from the viewer.
William Artis was a sculptor from Washington, NC. The Quiet One is a limestone sculpture depicting an introverted person. The figure has their head resting on their knees as their hands hold their knees to their chest, displaying a posture of solitude and isolation.
William Artis was a sculptor from Washington, NC. The Pugilist is a limestone sculpture of a Black boxer. Artis chiseled immense detail into the sculpture, capturing the intensity of his expression and hair texture.
Frederick C. Flemister was an artist from Jackson, GA. The Mourners is an expressionist painting that portrays a group of Black people mourning a lynching victim. It emulates the scene of Jesus’ crucifixion, showing two veiled women holding the victim while three others mourn separately. There is a cut noose hanging from a tree in the background.
Ernest Hardman was a painter from Detroit, MI. The Last Supper #2 is an abstract depiction of Jesus and His disciples sitting around a table. Unlike The Last Supper, Hardman decenters Jesus and creates a euphony of shape and color that resembles men debating around a table.
James Dallas Parks, born in St. Louis, Missouri, was a painter, sculptor, printmaker, and art historian. The Knockout depicts the iconic photograph of the Muhammed Ali versus Sonny Liston boxing match. Ali stands in a victor’s stance above Liston as he struggles to rise.
Cecil D Nelson Jr. was a 20th-century painter born in Champaign, IL. The Kitemakers shows two children sitting in a field before a log. A white boy on the left wearing a red shirt holds the kite while looking at a young Black boy on the right wearing a blue shirt. An orange kite flies in the background near two gas tanks and a grain bin.
Clarence Laudric Shivers was an artist and career military man who participated in the Tuskegee Program from St. Louis, MO. The House by the Side of the Road depicts a rural home behind a picket fence. This piece conveys rural life as a man lounges on a tree while clothes dry on the line.
Eva Booker was an artist from Atlanta, GA. The Girls is an abstract depiction of a group of girls with blonde hair, red bikini tops, and low-waisted skirts.
Howard E. Lewis was an Art professor and Korean War veteran from Columbus, OH. The Family is a freestanding Plaster sculpture of a family in an embrace. The father towers over his wife and child, looking down at them as his wife leans into his chest and their son into hers.
Frederick D. Jones, Jr. was a mid-twentieth-century artist from South Carolina. The Daughter of Eve depicts a woman wearing a ripped blue top, red lipstick, a snake bracelet, a red scarf, and a white magnolia in her hair. She holds a red apple and a green leaf and stares toward the viewer. Behind her is a white horse, a yellow tent, and a man dancing.
Marjorie W. Brown, born in North Carolina, was an artist who studied art at Spelman College. The City Is A Pattern is a watercolor artwork that shows the linear perspective of a city. Brown uses repeating lines and geometric shapes for buildings, windows, signs, and sidewalks to show a consistent landscape pattern.
Maurice Strider was an artist and art educator from Lexington, KY. The Carnival shows a carnival landscape with crowds of abstracted human figures walking around and riding a Ferris wheel. The hue composition of blue, pink, and gray is similar to Cubism.
William E. Rice was an artist from Tallahassee, FL. The Capitol is a perspective painting of a residential area beside a Capitol building. In the foreground are several houses with multi-colored trees between them; in the background are larger buildings, including the Capitol, under a cloudy blue sky.
Calvin Burnett was a graphic artist, illustrator, painter, designer, and art teacher from Cambridge, MA. The Box is a surrealist drawing of a Black woman seated in a box. The drawing's geometric complexity and the woman's reflections evoke an uncanny feeling.
Geraldine McCullough was a renowned painter and sculptor from Kingston, AR. The Black Knight depicts an abstract figure riding a creature like a horse. The figure is primarily black, with a twisted torso, and has masquerade-like attributes. The creature is predominantly black, with both ominous and mythical characteristics.
Harper T. Phillips was an artist from Courtland, AL. The Ant is a painting with numerous geometric forms and lines in a vertical composition. Each white, yellow, green, and black shape lay in pocketed areas overlapping black borders and lines.
Richmond Barthe was a sculptor from Bay St. Louis, Mississippi. The Angry Christ is an intensely expressive bust of Christ. The bust is incredibly detailed, emphasizing Jesus of Nazareth's Semitic features.
James Newton was a painter, printmaker, scholar, and professor from Delaware. The American Sixties is an assemblage that symbolizes the political turmoil and militarization that arose in the 1960s after the Civil Rights Movement.
J. Brooks Dendy III was a painter, graphic artist, and educator from Pittsburgh, PA. The Allegheny Valleys depicts an aerial view of a mountain range, valley, and river in Western Pennsylvania.
Shirley Bolton was a painter from Athens, GA. Tenement is a multimedia depiction of the entrance to a shared housing space. The dimensional browns of the buildings indicate the age and use of the tenement space. Three cardboard pieces on top of the painted surface add texture and form to the piece.
Jewell Woodard Simon was an internationally acclaimed artist, teacher, and poet from Houston, TX. Teen Enigma is a plaster bust of a young girl looking into the distance with her head raised. She is wearing a collared shirt with the top button clasped.
