Overview
A Site of Struggle: American Art against Anti-Black Violence explores how artists have grappled with the reality of anti-Black violence and its accompanying challenges of representation. From the horrors of slavery and lynching, to the violent suppression of civil rights struggles, to recent acts of police brutality, targeted violence has been an ever-present fact of Black lives in the United States, and images of African American suffering and death have constituted an enduring part of the nation’s cultural landscape.
The exhibition and its companion publication will investigate the conceptual and aesthetic strategies artists and activists use to engage with the issue of anti-Black violence, highlighting diverse works of art and ephemera from the late nineteenth century to the present day. A Site of Struggle includes artworks in modes from realism to abstraction, and in a range of mediums including photography, painting, sculpture, video, and sound and focuses, primarily, on the underexposed period between the beginning of anti-lynching campaigns in the 1890s and Emmett Till’s murder in 1955, as well as on works made between the 1970s and the founding of Black Lives Matter in 2013. This framing shows that grappling with anti-Black violence has been a consistent, not isolated, feature of American art. Works in the exhibition made after 2013 engage with historical events that happened prior to that date.
Above: Howardena Pindell (American, born 1943), Four Little Girls, 2020, mixed media on canvas, Courtesy the artist and Garth Greenan Gallery, New York
The exhibition and its companion publication will investigate the conceptual and aesthetic strategies artists and activists use to engage with the issue of anti-Black violence, highlighting diverse works of art and ephemera from the late nineteenth century to the present day.
Related Programs + Events
Arts+Activism: Museums as Spaces for Dialogue
Saturday, September 10, 2022
3 PM CT
Art+Letters: A Peculiar Indifference
Saturday, September 3, 2022
10 AM CT
Opening Reception and Discussion
Saturday, August 13, 2022
2–4 PM CT
Related Programs from The Block Museum of Art
A Conversation Series on Museum Practice: On Collaboration (Part I)
The Block Museum of Art, published 2022
A Conversation Series on Museum Practice: On Context (Part II)
The Block Museum of Art, published 2022
A Conversation Series on Museum Practice: On Counterpoints (Part III)
The Block Museum of Art, published 2022
A Conversation Series on Museum Practice: Allison Glenn and Janet Dees in Conversation (Part IV)
The Block Museum of Art, published 2022
Resources
Alabama Appleseed Center for Law & Justice
A non-profit, non-partisan organization working to achieve justice and equity for all Alabamians.
Alabama Institute for Social Justice
A non-profit organization advocating for social justice and racial reconciliation across Alabama.
American Civil Liberties Union of Alabama
The ACLU works in the courts, legislatures, and communities to defend the individual rights and personal freedoms guaranteed to us by the Constitution and the Bill of Rights.
The Equal Justice Initiative
The EJI is committed to ending mass incarceration and excessive punishment in the United States, to challenging racial and economic injustice, and to protecting basic human rights for the most vulnerable people in American society.
Global Project Against Hate and Extremism
Strengthening a diverse global community committed to exposing and countering racism, bigotry, and hatred.
Working to secure the equality of rights, eliminate race-based discrimination, ensure health and well-being, and collaborate with partners who also strive for the civil rights of all.
National Center for the Study of Civil Rights and African-American Culture
Located at Alabama State University this organization is a research institute and repository for the collection of civil rights and African-American cultural documents and artifacts and other memorabilia.
That’s My Child
This youth mentoring organization uses arts, education, and workforce development in an effort to end hopelessness and generational poverty within our community.
The Southern Poverty Law Center
The SPLC is a catalyst for racial justice in the South and beyond, working in partnership with communities to dismantle white supremacy, strengthen intersectional movements, and advance the human rights of all people.
Civil Rights Sites
The Civil Rights Memorial
A project of the Southern Poverty Law Center, this site serves as the interpretive center for the Civil Rights Memorial, which honors the movement’s martyrs and inspires visitors to continue the march for racial equity and social justice.
Freedom Riders Museum
Trace the Freedom Riders’ tumultuous journey through the South, along with historic images of the protest and voices of those who supported and opposed the Freedom Rides.
The Legacy Museum and National Memorial for Peace and Justice
This pair of sites is dedicated to telling the history of racial injustice in this country. The Legacy Museum is a narrative museum that uses interactive media, sculpture, videography, and exhibitions to immerse visitors in the sights and sounds of the slave trade, racial terrorism, the Jim Crow South, and the world’s largest prison system. The National Memorial for Peace and Justice, situated on a six-acre site atop
a rise overlooking Montgomery, is a sacred space for truth-telling and reflection about racial terror in America and its legacy.
Montgomery Interpretive Center at Alabama State University
Located on ASU’s campus, this site honors the 1965 Selma to Montgomery March and the heroes, martyrs, and foot-soldiers who made voting rights history happen.
The Rosa Parks Museum
The Rosa Parks Museum is a living memorial for Mrs. Parks and elevates her legacy by serving as a platform for scholarly dialogue, civic engagement, and positive social change. The Museum includes a permanent exhibit, “The Cleveland Avenue Time Machine,” as well as temporary art exhibitions and educational programs throughout the year.
Related Publication
A Site of Struggle: American Art against Anti-Black Violence
$39.95
Investigating the conceptual and aesthetic strategies artists have used to engage with the issue of anti-Black violence, A Site of Struggle highlights diverse works of art and ephemera from the post-Reconstruction period of the late nineteenth century to the founding of the Black Lives Matter movement. Foregrounding the perspectives of African American cultural producers, this book examines three major questions: How are graphic portrayals of violence enlisted to protest horrors like lynchings? How have artists employed conceptual strategies and varying degrees of abstraction to avoid literal representations of violence? And how do artists explore violence through subtler engagements with the Black body? Ultimately, A Site of Struggle highlights the ubiquity and impact of anti-Black violence by focusing on its depictions; by examining how art has been used to protest, process, mourn, and memorialize this violence; and by providing the historical context for contemporary debates about its representation.
The book’s essays offer new perspectives from established and emerging scholars working in the fields of African American studies, art history, communications, and history. Contributors include Sampada Aranke, Courtney Baker, Huey Copeland, Janet Dees, Leslie Harris, and LaCharles Ward.
Published by Princeton University Press in association with the Mary and Leigh Block Museum of Art, Northwestern University.
Hardcover
ISBN: 9780691209272
Published (US): January 25, 2022
Pages: 160 | Size: 11×9 inches | Illus: 60 color illustrations
- Available Fall 2022
Gallery
Related Exhibition
From the Vault
September 16 through December 11, 2022
Power for Change
August 13 through November 6, 2022
Organizer
A Site of Struggle is organized by the Mary and Leigh Block Museum of Art, Northwestern University, and is curated by Janet Dees, Steven and Lisa Munster Tananbaum Curator of Modern and Contemporary Art at The Block Museum of Art, with the assistance of Alisa Swindell, Curatorial Research Associate.
Sponsor
Lead support for the exhibition is generously provided by the Terra Foundation for American Art. Major support is provided by The Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts. The project is also supported in part by an award from the National Endowment for the Arts, the Bernstein Family Contemporary Art Fund, the Myers Foundations, the Block DEAI Fund, and the Block Board of Advisors. Generous support is contributed by William Spiegel and Lisa Kadin, the Alumnae of Northwestern University, the David C. and Sarajean Ruttenberg Arts Foundation, the Elizabeth F. Cheney Foundation, and by Lynne Jacobs. The related publication is co-published by The Block Museum of Art and Princeton University Press and is supported by Furthermore: a program of the J.M. Kaplan Fund and the Sandra L. Riggs Publication Fund.
Local Sponsors
Local support for this exhibition was provided by lead sponsor Lamar. Additional support was provided by sponsors Mr. Will Hill Tankersley and Dr. Kristin Tankersley and co-sponsors AmeriFirst Bank; Balch & Bingham, LLP; Mr. and Mrs. Marvin H. Campbell II; Captrust; Ms. Camille Elebash-Hill and Mr. W. Inge Hill, Jr.; Mr. and Mrs. L. Daniel Morris, Jr.; Dr. and Mrs. Alfred J. Newman, Jr.; River Bank & Trust; Warren Averett, LLC, and Valley Bank.
