From an email press release:
Frank Stewart (left) ; Petra Richterova (right)
On Thursday evening, November 10th, a watershed event in the emergence of The New Harlem Renaissance will take place when Essie Green Galleries joins Jumel Terrace Books and The Museum of Art and Origins in celebrating their inaugural openings. That evening, from 6 to 9, all three venues will open the doors of their landmark Sugar Hill brownstones in an ongoing cultural collaboration. The location of the venues of this collaboration revives the rich brownstone soirée traditions associated with Harlem.
Sherman Edmiston’s Essie Green Galleries, at 419 Convent Avenue (148th St.), is the only gallery with a permanent exhibition of Black American Masters of the 19th and 20th century, not just in Harlem but anywhere ... Thursday evening, November 10th in conjunction with the openings on Jumel Terrace and Gilliam’s opening at the Corcoran Museum, Essie Green Galleries will feature the works of Sam Gilliam.
Sam Gilliam Untitled (2004) Relief woodcut and collage on felt
image source
At Jumel Terrace Books, 426 W. 160 St. Dr. Robert Farris Thompson of Yale University will be signing copies of Tango: The Art History of Love –a surprising look into the African origins of the Tango. [see earlier post on Dr. Thompson]
It’s just a few blocks up the Hill, past the Duke Ellington residence, and up Jumel Terrace, where Paul Robeson resided, to 430 West 162nd Street, The Museum of Art and Origins (MoAaO). This is the only collection of African tribal art in private hands dedicated to public interactivity and the only research facility where scholars and students can physically examine the types of objects they are studying. Here, Dr. George Nelson Preston, Dr. Dinah Papi-Guimaerens, and J.C. Wu present a collection that includes a blacksmith’s bellows of the Fang people, a Kete people’s drum with a pair of Janis heads and a pair of Galoa bwiti posts. Also on view are several 18th to early 20th East Asian works on paper, and Contemporary art–objects that tell stories of their origins.
In its photography gallery Museum of Art and Origins presents Delta to Delta: From The Niger to The Mississippi : Photographs of West Africa, Cuba and Louisiana 1977-2005, by Frank Stewart and Petra Richterova. Opening November 11th, thereafter 7 days a week by appointment through December 7th 2005.
Frank Stewart won an Emmy for his Bearden Plays Bearden. He is co-author with Wynton Marsalis of Sweet Swing Blues on the Road: A Year With Wynton Marsalis and His Septet and with Lolis Eric Lolie of Smokestack Lightning: Adventures in the Heart of Barbecue Country. Stewart has accompanied Dr. George N. Preston on several fieldwork trips in Africa. He will be present to sign copies of his books including the latest, Bearden by Frank Stewart (2005).
Petra Richterova has exhibited with Frank Stewart at the Fourth Street Gallery and Lincoln Center and is currently a doctoral candidate in Art History (Africa and the Caribbean) at Yale University. She has done extensive fieldwork in Ghana and Burkina Faso with Frank Stewart and Dr. Preston.
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