Figuring It Out: The Black Body by Global Black Artists, 2010-2020 with Lowery Stokes Sims

During the decade of 2010-2020, the global art world experienced a literal explosion of Black artists from the United States, Africa and the African diaspora working with the Black figure as the focus of their creativity.
Presented by Lowery Stokes Sims, this lecture examines how artists have continued the project of representing Black bodies in the global exhibition and market scene, albeit in the context of persistence discourses on imperialism and colonialism, escalating forced migration, state surveillance and violence against black bodies-male, female, gay and transgender-revelations of sexual exploitation and-not incidentally-a global pandemic.
The lecture demonstrates the dizzying variety of technical and stylistic approaches to figuration, which seem at the same time to reveal tentacles that connect these distinct approaches to the figure that speak of lineages that often cross boundaries and cultures. With this arsenal of modernist attitudes, styles and techniques at their disposal, the question is how each artist chooses to adapt them to depict images that can be personally charged, or culturally-responsive.
Lowery Stokes Sims served on the education and curatorial staff of The Metropolitan Museum of Art (1972-99), as executive director and president The Studio Museum in Harlem (2000-2007) and retired as Curator Emerita from the Museum of Art and Design (2007-2015).
Over the last few years, Sims has been an independent curator and consultant for the Caribbean Cultural Center, the Contemporary Arts Center, Cincinnati, Craft Contemporary, Grounds for Sculpture, the Baltimore Museum of Art, and the Center for Art, Design & Visual Culture, University of Maryland, Baltimore County. She was Visiting Professor at the Institute of Fine Arts, New York University (2018-2020) and the 2021-22 Kress-Beinecke Professor at the Center for Advanced Study in the Visual Arts at the National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.
1:26 Praising art fairs and the exhibition and acquisition committees of museums for exhibiting the work of black artists-phenomenon
2:57 Lowery Stokes Sims’ art collection
3:28 Examples of Varying Styles of Figuration
4:14 How these artists came to the attention of the art market
6:45 Examples of pieces that depict the transnational character lives of artists and the art they make
8:31 Examples of Figuration of Women
9:37 Examples of Texture and Pattern
10:17 Examples Depicting the Ordinary in Contemporary Black Lives
11:29 Examples of Pattern and Decoration trends
13:18 Examples of Women and Water
16:20 How Painting has a Place in African Art Production/ The Aims of Africanization
20:19 Role of publications in the role of global modern art in Africa
21:27 Predecessors and relationships between generations of artists
24:02 Thematic interests and influences on artists and how to analyze the subject matter
25:55 How artists’ choices reflect the political environment for black artists and how the world views Black bodies
27:24 examples of artwork that celebrate the rights and acceptance in global LGBTQI+ Community
27:55 examples of artwork that celebrate the beauty and dignity of contemporary black artists
28:52 examples of artwork that depict humanity… memory and aspiration
29:40 examples of artwork that depict transgression and piety of black women
30:52 Figurative Art critics question on whether the art is empathy or voyeurism
31:38 Issues around the Black Body in Art and Questions to Think About
35:34 Context for the creation of Black Imagery
38:48 Conclusion