When
the Georgia Museum of Art first opened its doors after construction of the new
additions and renovations to the facility, one of the first exhibitions to
grace our halls was “Tradition Redefined: The Larry and Brenda Thompson
Collection of African American Art.”
Initially, the collection was a
travelling exhibition from a private collection and organized by the David C.
Driskell Center for the Study of Visual Arts and Culture of African American
and the African Diaspora at the University of Maryland, College Park. “Tradition
Redefined” comprises 72 works dating from 2007 back to the 1890s. The 67
artists, both celebrated and regional, who produced these paintings and
sculptures were picked by the Thompsons for their “untraditional” narratives
and conventions of presenting African American art and the African American diaspora.
Little did we know, however, that the exhibition would become a prized component
of our permanent collection.
Radcliffe Bailey |
The Thompsons generously donated
their collection to the museum in 2011, during the 50th-anniversary celebration
of the University of Georgia’s desegregation, as well as providing the
financial support to create a new curatorial position at the museum: the Larry
D. and Brenda A. Thompson Curator of the African Diaspora. This curator will
oversee the museum’s collection of paintings, sculptures, and other artistic
media by African and African American artists as well as being an adjunct
faculty member of the Lamar Dodd School of Art. This is not the first time the
Thompsons participated in the museum’s and the university’s academic affairs.
Larry, as a former U.S. deputy attorney general, has spoken numerous times at
the university since 2001, and taught for a brief time at UGA’s law school as
the John A. Sibley Professor in Corporate and Business Law before being
recalled to PepsiCo. Brenda currently serves on the Board of Trustees for the
Barnes Foundation and the Board of the Clark Atlanta University Art Galleries.
She also joined the museum’s Board of Advisors in 2011. Obviously, it would be
a gross understatement to say that the Thompsons value education.
Stephanie Jackson |
The collection itself has given
more variety and depth to the museum’s new galleries, but for the moment it has
moved on from GMOA. An exhibition such as this one should be shared with as
many people as possible, and “Tradition Redefined” is currently on display at
the Rice University Art Gallery in Houston, Texas, as part of the university’s centennial
celebration, where it will be until Nov. 18. Along with 15 other commemorative
exhibitions around Rice, “Tradition Redefined” will help highlight and
celebrate the 100 years of change that transformed Rice from a small university
close to the middle of nowhere to an international and educational success.
After that, the collection will travel to Knoxville, Tenn., to be featured in the
Knoxville Museum of Art April 11 through June 16, 2013.
If you have the opportunity to see "Tradition Redefined" at Rice, the Knoxville Museum of Art or elsewhere on the road, we hope you stop by and take a look at it, as well as at any of our other travelling exhibitions on tour. As part of our mission, GMOA supports and promotes the spread of the visual arts as tools of education, but it is up to our patrons, both near and far, to use them.
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