MOCA Jacksonville presents 'Black Art Matters' lecture series
MOCA Jacksonville is pleased to present the Lecture Series “Black Art Matters (BAM)”, a monthly series bringing Black art and culture, representation and history as topics addressed through talks by noted artists, curators, and historians working, thinking and writing from the heart of the perspective of the African American experience.
Based on the mission of MOCA to address the “art, artists and ideas of our time”, the BAM monthly lecture series brings current nationally acclaimed African American artists, curators and historians that speak through their work to the issues of our time.
“In many ways, the work made by African American artists today is at the forefront of the dismantling of traditional art categories and practices; mixing and breaking and diffusing the boundaries in between, while bringing to the fore questions about issues of racialization, gender and sexuality,” said MOCA Senior Curator Ylva Rouse. “The BAM lecture series aims to bring the voices of these artists to the Jacksonville community and contribute to important dialogue on a local as well as a national level.”
The BAM series presented its first lecture, by acclaimed artist Hank Willis Thomas, in April of this year, and will begin its Fall Season on September 14, with a virtual lecture by Allison M. Glenn, Senior Curator and Director of Public Art at Contemporary Arts Museum Houston, Texas. Most recently, Glenn received substantial critical and community praise for her exhibition at the Speed Art Museum in Louisville, Kentucky titled Promise, Witness, Remembrance, an exhibition that reflected on the life of Breonna Taylor. Prior to her tenure in Houston, Glenn served as curator at Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art, Bentonville, Arkansas, where she worked with artists such as Rashid Johnson, Sarah Braman, Sam Falls, Odili Donald Odita, Jessica Stockholder, George Sanchez-Calderon, Bethany Collins, and more. Glenn is a member of Madison Square Park Conservancy’s Public Art Consortium Collaboration Committee, and sits on the Board of Directors for ARCAthens, a curatorial and artist residency program based in Athens, Greece and the Bronx, New York. She received dual master’s degrees from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago in Modern Art History, Theory and Criticism and Arts Administration and Policy, and a Bachelor of Fine Art Photography with a co-major in Urban Studies from Wayne State University in Detroit. In 2015, Glenn was a Curatorial Fellow with the City of Chicago’s Department of Cultural Affairs and Special Events.
“We are honored to welcome Allison Glenn to MOCA to present as part of our new BAM lecture series”, said Caitlín Doherty, MOCA’s Executive Director. “BAM is an important part of MOCA’s ongoing commitment to addressing issues of diversity, equity and inclusion, through our programming, our working and our engagement with issues most pertinent to our community.”
Upcoming BAM lectures include María Magdalena Campos Pons, Charles Gaines, Cameron Shaw, Tschabalala Self, Odili Donald Odita and Kalup Linzy.
This lecture series is free of charge. Register online. For more information on general exhibition programming go to mocajacksonville.unf.edu.