New exhibit at El Paso Museum of Art highlights representation of Black women in US

Times staff report
·3 min read
A man on Wednesday walks by the painting "Double Cherry Blossoms," by Alma Thomas, which is in a new art exhibit, “There is a Woman in Every Color: Black Women in Art," opening Friday at the El Paso Museum of Art. It will run through May 14 in the Woody and Gayle Hunt Family Gallery.
A man on Wednesday walks by the painting "Double Cherry Blossoms," by Alma Thomas, which is in a new art exhibit, “There is a Woman in Every Color: Black Women in Art," opening Friday at the El Paso Museum of Art. It will run through May 14 in the Woody and Gayle Hunt Family Gallery.

A new art exhibit focusing on Black women in the United States opens Friday at the El Paso Museum of Art.

“There is a Woman in Every Color: Black Women in Art" will be on view through May 14 at the Woody and Gayle Hunt Family Gallery on the second floor of the museum at 1 Arts Festival Plaza in Downtown.

The exhibit first was presented at the Bowdoin College Museum of Art in Brunswick, Maine, in fall 2021, according to a news release. El Paso is its second touring stop.

The exhibit examines the representation of Black women in the United States over the past two centuries. It features more than 40 artworks from the Bowdoin museum's collection and confronts the history of marginalization, the news release said.

It also makes visible the presence of women of color in the history of American art and is inspired by African American artist Elizabeth Catlett’s 1975 work, “There is a Woman in Every Color.”

“We’re excited to be partnering with the El Paso Museum of Art on this project,” Bowdoin College Museum of Art co-directors Anne Collins Goodyear and Frank Goodyear said in the news release. “El Paso has a long and proud artistic tradition, and we look forward to sharing this important exhibition with art lovers in the Southwest.”

The exhibit features five thematic sections: portraiture, documented histories, labor, artistic exploration and the influence of literature.

"The Sunflower Quilting Bee at Arles," 1996, is a lithograph by Faith Ringgold and a gift of Julie L. McGee, Class of 1982, Bowdoin College Museum of Art, copyrighted in 2021 by Faith Ringgold, Artists Rights Society, New York. Courtesy ACA Galleries, New York.
"The Sunflower Quilting Bee at Arles," 1996, is a lithograph by Faith Ringgold and a gift of Julie L. McGee, Class of 1982, Bowdoin College Museum of Art, copyrighted in 2021 by Faith Ringgold, Artists Rights Society, New York. Courtesy ACA Galleries, New York.

It contains works by 20th and 21st century artists, including Emma Amos, Elizabeth Catlett, Alma Thomas, Carrie Mae Weems, Betye Saar, Faith Ringgold, Barbara Chase-Riboud, Kara Walker, Mickalene Thomas, LaToya Ruby Frazier and Nyeema Morgan.

Supporting these works will be a selection of 19th century works of art highlighting the continuity of experience of Black women in America, the news release said.

“I’m deeply appreciative of the community responses I’ve received about the exhibition thus far,” curator Elizabeth S. Humphrey said in a news release. “I am excited for people in El Paso to engage with the exhibition and look forward to seeing what resonates.”

"There is a Woman in Every Color," 1975, a color linoleum, cut, screen-print and woodcut by Elizabeth Catlett is a museum purchase by the Lloyd O. Marjorie Strong Coulter Fund for the Bowdoin College Museum of Art, copyrighted in 2021 by the Catlett Mora Family Trust, licensed by VAGA at Artists Rights Society, New York.
"There is a Woman in Every Color," 1975, a color linoleum, cut, screen-print and woodcut by Elizabeth Catlett is a museum purchase by the Lloyd O. Marjorie Strong Coulter Fund for the Bowdoin College Museum of Art, copyrighted in 2021 by the Catlett Mora Family Trust, licensed by VAGA at Artists Rights Society, New York.

The exhibition will be accompanied by complementary events:

  • Workshop with the Center for Afrofuturist Studies and local artists from 5 to 7 p.m. Feb. 23

  • Guerilla Girls Workshop from 5 p.m. to 7 p.m. March 10

  • Gallery tour and college workshop with Humphrey from noon to 4 p.m. April 29

  • Panel discussion: Women in Art at 2 p.m. May 5

"Double Cherry Blossoms," 1973, is acrylic on canvas, by Alma Thomas. It is a gift of Halley K Harrisburg, Bowdoin College Class of 1990, and Michael Rosenfeld, Bowdoin College Museum of Art.
"Double Cherry Blossoms," 1973, is acrylic on canvas, by Alma Thomas. It is a gift of Halley K Harrisburg, Bowdoin College Class of 1990, and Michael Rosenfeld, Bowdoin College Museum of Art.

“There is a Woman in Every Color: Black Women in Art” is organized by the Bowdoin College Museum of Art.

This tour is supported by the Art Bridges Foundation, which is dedicated to expanding access to American art across the nation. Additional support is provided by the Mellon Foundation, The Texas Commission on the Arts, the El Paso Museum of Art Foundation and the El Paso Museums and Cultural Affairs Department.

For more information on the El Paso Museum of Art, visit www.epma.art.

This article originally appeared on El Paso Times: El Paso Museum of Art exhibit studies representation of Black women