A Salute to the Bicentennial of the Keystone State

Posted by on Nov 29, 2013 in | Comments Off on A Salute to the Bicentennial of the Keystone State The current Bicentennial celebration commemorates not the birth of the United States, but the proclama­tion of thirteen British-American colonies that were “free and independent states” as of July 4, 17.76. When they formed a loose compact in 1761, their articles of confederation declared that “each state retains its sover­eignty, freedom and independence.” The...
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Black Cultural Development in Pennsylvania Since 1900

Posted by on Nov 29, 2013 in | Comments Off on Black Cultural Development in Pennsylvania Since 1900 The cultural history of Blacks in America is varied and diverse. At the same time, it is deeply inter­woven into the whole of America’s cultural fabric. Yet, the significant cultural contributions of Black Amer­icans have been overlooked. Because of this omission, it was not until the beginning of the twentieth century that the art of Afro-Americans began to receive the recognition it so...
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The Resurrection of Henry Ossawa Tanner

Posted by on Nov 26, 2013 in | Comments Off on The Resurrection of Henry Ossawa Tanner The annals of American art are crowded with artists who achieved renown in their life­times, but whose reputations – for a variety of reasons – faded after their demise. No story is more poignant than that of Henry Ossawa Tanner (1859-1937), a gifted African American painter who grew up in Philadelphia, but, to escape painful discrimination, pursued his career in France. Henry Ossawa...
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Pippin

Posted by on Nov 26, 2013 in | Comments Off on Pippin Artistic reputations are – much like the stock market – hard to assess, and harder yet to predict. Such is the case with the career of Horace Pippin (1888-1946), a self-taught African American painter who lived in West Chester in southeastern Pennsylvania. An artist of national standing by the early 1940s, Pippin had made a meteoric rise from the local renown of his Chester County...
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Currents

Posted by on Nov 26, 2013 in | Comments Off on Currents Famous Faces John W. Mosley (1907-1969), characterized by an admirer as “our most magnificent and beloved photographer,” was Philadelphia’s leading black photographer, whose images appeared in nearly every African American newspaper on the East Coast (see “His Eye Was On The Positive” by Richard D. Beards in the winter 1990 edition of Pennsylvania Heritage)....
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The Protégé Becomes a Prophet: Meta Vaux Warrick Fuller

Posted by on Nov 26, 2013 in | Comments Off on The Protégé Becomes a Prophet: Meta Vaux Warrick Fuller Auguste Rodin (1840-1917) pronounced her a born artist, and in the dazzling cultural circles of Paris her works of art garnered breathless praise. Yet, in her own country, African American sculptor Meta Vaux Warrick Fuller (1877-1962) of Philadelphia lived and worked unknown to many, until at last she emerged from the stultifying shadows of racial intolerance and domestic responsibilities to...
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Charles Grafly: An Apostle of American Art

Posted by on Nov 26, 2013 in | Comments Off on Charles Grafly: An Apostle of American Art From the earliest days through most of the nineteenth century, sculpture in America was the enterprise of w1tutored artisans, craftsmen, stonecutters, and woodcarvers modestly plying their trade on furniture, gravestones, figureheads, and shop signs. Lacking opportunities for academic training at home, ambitious craftsmen flocked first to Rome and, following the Civil War, to Paris to learn the...
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Two Hundred Years and Counting – The Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts

Posted by on Nov 25, 2013 in | Comments Off on Two Hundred Years and Counting – The Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts Two centuries ago, on Thursday, Decem­ber 26, 1805, seventy-one individuals gathered at the State House (now Independence Hall) to formally establish an art institution for Philadelphia. Meetings throughout the summer had led to the drafting of a charter, formation of a board of directors, and the collection of funds for a building. By the day after Christmas, a professional calligraph­er had...
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Out and About

Posted by on Nov 20, 2013 in | Comments Off on Out and About Soul Soldiers The Senator John Heinz Pittsburgh Regional History Center recently unveiled the most comprehensive exhibition ever to explore the issues of the Vietnam War from an African American perspective. “Soul Soldiers: African Americans and the Vietnam Era” tells the story of the Vietnam War’s impact on African American life and culture by examining both the war and the civil rights...
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Bookshelf

Posted by on Nov 20, 2013 in | Comments Off on Bookshelf Building Harrisburg: The Architects and Builders, 1719–1941 by Ken Frew published by the Historical Society of Dauphin County and the Historic Harrisburg Association, 2009; 396 pages, cloth, $75.00 Ken Frew spent thirty years researching and writing Building Harrisburg: The Architects and Builders, 1719–1941, and the investment of time and effort, as well as considerable talent, has resulted in...
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