In Common Exhibition
For the exhibition In Common: New Approaches with Romare Bearden (November 9, 2023–January 15, 2024), The New School’s Institute on Race, Power and Political Economy and the Vera List Center for Art and Politics, the Romare Bearden Foundation, and The Institute of Jazz Studies at Rutgers University Newark combined forces to examine the impact of Bearden’s work under three distinct lenses—the concepts and contents of his activist work, especially his prints; the role of music in both his practice at large and the activist projects; and the resonance of his oeuvre in contemporary art making.
The exhibition anchored the In Common: Romare Bearden and New Approaches to Art, Race & Economy (November 30–December 2, 2023) as part of a multitier initiative examining Bearden’s artistic and activist legacies. Here, we highlighted Bearden’s work as an educator, scholar, writer, songwriter, and social activist, by paying particular attention to his prints and collages. Drawing from the Romare Bearden Foundation’s collection and other collections, including The New School Art Collection, the exhibition presented a selection of works where Bearden explored the Black experience, often taking inspiration from history, literature, the Bible, jazz, and African American communities. It was complemented by six leading and emerging contemporary artists—Black Quantum Futurism, Kahlil Robert Irving, Lorraine O’Grady, Hank Willis Thomas, Mickalene Thomas, and Charisse Pearlina Weston—whose work and values resonate with those of Bearden, thus contributing to a multi-generational dialogue on the political agency of art.
Print-making has always been considered at the forefront of political activism. Bearden used the medium for this purpose, as well as to explore his experimental impulses and to make his statements available to broader audiences. The six artists invited to join the Bearden project build on this understanding of the political efficacy of printmaking as it relates to Bearden and are pushing, subverting, expanding, and playing with contemporary applications and opportunities of “print” and image-making. As they work through an explosive range of print techniques involving ink, glue, glass, paper, and textiles, and expand on old and new technologies from gelatin silver photography to lenticular processes, including installation, print-based sculptural forms, and musical performance, Black Quantum Futurism, Kahlil Robert Irving, Lorraine O’Grady, Hank Willis Thomas, Mickalene Thomas, and Charisse Pearlina Weston extend the legacy of Romare Bearden into the future.
The exhibition was co-curated by Johanne Bryant-Reid, Diedra Harris-Kelley, Carin Kuoni, and Eriola Pira.
