Exhibit ponders art and beauty

by in At the Museums dept

FORT WAYNE, IN (AAPDN) – Opening Saturday, August 22, 2020 at the Fort Wayne Museum of Art, this exhibit, “Posing Beauty in African American Culture” explores the contested ways in which African and African American beauty have been represented in historical and contemporary contexts, through a diverse range of media, including photography, film, video, fashion, advertising and other forms of popular culture, such as music and the Internet.

Curated by Deborah Willis and organized by Curatorial Assistance Traveling Exhibitions, Pasadena, California, throughout the Western history of art and image-making, the relationship between beauty and art has become increasingly complex within contemporary art and popular culture. http://www.curatorial.org/posing-beauty-in-african-american-culture

Carrie Mae Weems, “I Looked and Looked but Failed to See What do Terrified You” (Louisiana Project Series), 2006. Photo from www.curatorial.org.

The first of three thematic sections, “Constructing a Pose” considers the interplay between the historical and the contemporary, between self-representation and imposed representation, and the relationship between subject and photographer.

The second theme, “Body and Image” questions the ways in which our contemporary understanding of beauty has been constructed and framed through the body.

The last section, “Modeling Beauty & Beauty Contests” invites us to reflect upon the ambiguities of beauty, its impact on mass culture and individuals and how the display of beauty affects the ways in which we see and interpret the world and ourselves.

The FWMoA is collaborating with For Communities of Color, a local group which strives to educate, engage and empower black and indigenous people of color, led by Clydia and Sherry Early.

Special programming includes a social media photography project featuring local people of color as well as a Facebook Live presentation on Thursday, August 20, 2020 at 7:00 pm discussing the topic of beauty in Black culture.

A Curator’s Tour of the exhibition is offered Thursday, September 3, 2020 at 12:15 pm both at the Museum and virtually on Facebook Live. The in-person tour is included with museum admission and masks will be required.