This collection showcases the rich legacies of HBCUs through artistic expression. Featured works include paintings, sculptures, murals, mixed media, prints, drawings, and fine art photography.
Frederick C. Flemister, native to Jackson, GA, was a student of Hale A. Woodruff at Atlanta University in the 1940s. Self-Portrait is an impressionistic piece depicting Flemister preparing to paint. He is standing in front of a canvas while holding a paintbrush in his left hand and a palette in his right.
Elizabeth Montgomery Shelton’s “Self-portrait” is a bust of the artist herself, carrying her child on her back. Embellishments, including spirals, adorn her head in a faithful execution of Professor Carroll Harris Simms’ instruction. The artist had previously created a different self-portrait sculpture and was encouraged to create this piece by Biggers and Simms after the birth of her child.
Cecil D Nelson Jr. was a painter born in Champaign, IL. Self Portrait - Confronted Age, 16 depicts a Black male teenager haunted by racial violence. He sits in a chair holding a paintbrush with his hand on his head, wearing a shirt with a target symbol. There is also a rope, mask, and torn newspaper with the headline “lynch.”
Hayward Oubre was a multimedia artist and educator from New Orleans, LA. Seated Woman is a sculpture of a bodacious woman with a solemn expression. Her right arm is crossed over her chest, and her left arm hangs between her legs.
Jack Adams was an artist from Atlanta, GA. Seated Figure depicts a wearied woman resting after domestic duties. She sits in a green chair in front of an ironing board, dressed in a purple dress, blue headdress, stockings, and brown boots.
Robert A. Daniel was an artist from Tallahassee, FL. Seated Figure is a portrait of a Black woman sitting in a green chair in front of an ironing board. She seems to be resting from doing domestic labor.
Harvey W. Lee Jr. was born in St. Louis, MO, and he moved to Daytona Beach, FL. to teach art history professor at Bethune-Cookman College in 1952. Seascape depicts a house by the sea. The cubist painting uses intersecting stark black lines with shades of brown, green, blue, and red to create a full composition.
This maquette is a largely realistic depiction of a sea lion. The sea lion is adorned with swirls, the most common visual motif used by Simms' students in their sculptures. The final, full-size version of the sculpture contains even more embellishments that the maquette lacks.
Rison-Isom’s print depicts a woman kneeling to clean wooden floors with a scrubber and bucket. The room appears worn and cracked, indicating age and heavy use. This work highlights the importance of Black women’s labor, which has too often been neglected. In the 19th and 20th centuries, huge numbers of Black women worked as domestic laborers.
Goffney's intricate mural suggests themes of scientific discovery, fluid energy, and mid-century lifestyles. Scenes of nightlife and a rural church are featured on the right. Goffney signed his last name as Goeenet, perhaps his artist name.
Royal’s mural illustrates the desegregation of public schools following Brown v. Board of Education (1954). In the center of the scene is attorney and future Supreme Court justice Thurgood Marshall, with Black students entering integrated schools. At the far left is Chief Justice Earl Warren.
William Hayden was a painter and educator from Lexington, NC. Saturday Night Function is a juke joint scene depicting Black people dancing, playing instruments, and socializing. Hayden illuminates the interiorities of African-American nightlife in the mid-1900s.
Leon Lank Leonard, Sr. was a painter, sculptor, and educator from Waco, TX. Sad Jester combines gestural line art, expressive brushwork, and abstract forms. These techniques are layered to create a face that is centered in the composition. There are mixes and hues of blue, red, green, yellow, orange, and black.
Perkins’ landscape painting displays a rural scene featuring barns, farmhouses, and a sleeping cow. The landscape is divided with lush greenery and dry, brown land. The fence shows its age in its bent and leaning posts. Dr. John Biggers encouraged Texas Southern student artists to create art based on what they saw – perhaps this instruction inspired Perkins, who may have grown up in a rural environment similar to this one.
John Woodrow Wilson was a sculptor, painter, printmaker, and educator from Roxbury, MA. Roxbury Rooftops depicts an urbanscape from the perspective of the rooftops. The buildings closest to the viewer are shown in hues of red, orange, and yellow. Buildings further away are more brown, green, and gray.
John Woodrow Wilson, a sculptor, painter, and printmaker from Roxbury, MA, was known for his creative portraits and stylistic approach to social justice. Roxbury Landscape shows a gated park under a blue, white, and yellow sky. Behind other buildings, there is a tall church and a courtyard with bare trees, depicting Autumn in Wilson’s hometown.
Scott’s sculpture depicts a large rooster crowing. The artist uses multiple colors of clay in his piece. Like other sculptures created for classes that Professor Simms taught, “Rooster” features numerous embellishments throughout the work, including various nodules and swirls. Creating sculptures of this style requires multiple firings in the kiln.
This mural was painted by one of the many Asian students who enrolled in Texas Southern during the 1980s. A wooden ship with sails is seen in contrast with a modern airplane on the right side. On the left, a tower suggestive of a pagoda imbues a sense of history and culture.
Moe's work displays a joyous religious gathering, featuring a preacher, dancers, musicians, and others. The group appears to be performing a ring shout, or praise break, a characteristic tradition of some Black churches in the Southern US involving dancing, stomping, and singing.
Margaret Taylor Goss Burroughs was an artist, historian, teacher, and writer from St. Rose, LA. Ribbon Man: Mexico City Market is a watercolor scene of a mother buying ribbons for her children. The ribbon seller joyously sells his colorful ribbons in the middle of a market in Mexico City, MX.
Romeyn van Vleck Lippman was a 19th-century painter and educator. Revival depicts three figures standing in a position of grief and consolation. The central Black boy is looking down grievingly, a Black woman is behind him with an averted gaze, and to his left is a veiled elderly White woman gazing at him while holding his chest.
William H. Johnson was a painter from Florence, SC. Red Cross Knitting Center depicts seven Black women in lab coats and aprons. The women are knitting in support of the Red Cross' relief efforts. The Red Cross began knitting campaigns in 1917 during World War I.
Simms’ ceramic vessel is hollow, with an opening at the top, and has a red and gray glaze. Carroll Harris Simms worked alongside Dr. John T. Biggers to establish the Texas Southern University Art Department. Simms taught sculpture, ceramics, and jewelry-making classes.
Calvin Burnett was a graphic artist, illustrator, painter, designer, and art teacher from Cambridge, MA. Recurring Dream depicts a girl plagued by supernatural nightmares. The sleeping Black girl rises in the air as a white hag floats above her.
This work by Raheem Bellard is a self-portrait of the artist, with his face illuminated by the sun, wearing a green scarf. Cool colors are used throughout the piece, which enhances the tranquility of the composition.
James Conroy Yeargans was a painter from Kansas City, MI. Quest of Blue is an abstract painting with colored layers that create a myriad of forms. The word “quest” can be seen as the letters are connected by gestured strokes and lines.
John Farrar was a child prodigy who won the 3rd Atlanta Art Annuals at age 15. His winning piece, Queenie, is a realist depiction of a dog lying on a white sheet in a dark room.
“Queen Rabbit,” by Earl Jones, features a mythical female rabbit. The center of the body includes an oval-like opening with identical circular holes on the legs and feet, creating balance. The rabbit’s ears are constructed with a removable crown piece; the same technique is used in several busts created by other Texas Southern artists.
This is a publisher’s proof for Long’s piece Roma, which was created during his 1990-91 Prix de Rome fellowship. Featuring a blobby figure and colorful swirls, the composition is somewhat reminiscent of Da Vinci’s Vitruvian Man. Long rose to prominence as an “outsider artist” without formal training, later becoming one of the co-founders of Project Row Houses.
