GROUP EXHIBITION

Presented in the SCAD Museum of Art’s Evans Center for African American Studies, Aaron Douglas: Sermons explores the artist’s profound influence on creative practice today. The exhibition places key artworks by Douglas (American, 1899–1979) in conversation with work by contemporary artists, forming a constellation of connections, resonances, and direct references to Douglas’ work that demonstrates how the artist’s influence and the spirit of the Harlem Renaissance remain very much alive. The exhibition includes work by Adebukola Bodunrin and Ezra Claytan Daniels, Afua Richardson, Akeema-Zane and Rena Anakwe, Allison Janae Hamilton, Diedrick Brackens, Khari Johnson Ricks, and Kara Walker.

Born in Topeka, Kan., Douglas was a defining artist of the Harlem Renaissance, a period of rich cross-disciplinary activity within African American art and culture. Douglas, a painter, illustrator, and visual arts educator, was a multimodal artist whose diverse body of work includes public murals and illustrations of significant texts addressing social issues of race and segregation in the U.S. By mixing a wide variety of aesthetic and stylistic influences, including African-centric imagery, Douglas helped establish a groundbreaking visual vocabulary for Black Americans that captured the complexity of African American identity and history while centering the stories and contributions of his peers and contemporaries.

Credits

Aaron Douglas: Sermons is organized by SCAD Museum of Art adjunct curator DJ Hellerman; Joël Díaz, director of the museum’s Walter and Linda Evans Center for African American Studies; and SCAD MOA assistant curator Brittany Richmond.

Press

“Aaron Douglas: Sermons,” Ladi’Sasha Jones, e-flux Criticism, January 18, 2023