The art world is no stranger to controversy. Recently, a number of major museums on both sides of the Atlantic […]
Joseph Cornell, Earl Cunningham, and Collecting
In my research into the CFAM American collection, I have been moving more-or-less alphabetically by century, with occasional detours to […]
A Minor Jacob Lawrence Mystery Solved
Back in June, I wrote about Jacob Lawrence’s silkscreen practice, relating it to his long-running immersion in Black life and […]
Oil Sketches at CFAM
In July you may have seen me deliver a Collections Conversations talk on one of my favorite objects in the […]
Jean Charlot and the Joy of Discovery
As I have written this blog, I have tended to highlight recent scholarship that sheds new light on artists on […]
Blackness and Abstraction, Part 2
A few weeks ago, I wrote about the African American abstract painter Sam Gilliam and his sometimes uneasy relationship with […]
Connoisseurship, Part 2: Jennie Augusta Brownscombe
In the very first entry in this blog series I wrote about connoisseurship, one of the processes art historians use […]
Sam Gilliam and Blackness
Sam Gilliam has long been one of the foremost American abstract painters, as well as one of the most successful […]
On the Direct Encounter with the Work of Art
I live in a smallish college town in the Blue Ridge Mountains, far from the bustling museum and gallery scenes […]
Arthur B. Davies, Modern Art, and Yoga
I, like many people across the country, have been using YouTube yoga videos to break up my routine and introduce […]
Romare Bearden, Activism, and Art
Recently in the United States there has been a great outpouring of activism, causing many of us to examine our […]
Alexander Pope’s Portrait of Duke and the Long History of Animal Portraiture
During the past months of lockdown, many of us have been spending a lot of time with our beloved pets. […]
Emory Douglas’s Revolutionary Newspaper Art
Over the past weeks, due to the killing of George Floyd by former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin, America has […]
A Late-Career Silkscreen by Jacob Lawrence
This week I have been immersed in the life and work of Jacob Lawrence, one of the best-known artists of […]
Research Highlights, Part 9: John James Audubon’s Birds of America
I am fortunate to live in a house with big, floor-to-ceiling windows. While researching the CFAM collection I often sit […]
