Gallery Talk | "For America," Seeing and Meaning: The Self Portrait by Hughie Lee-Smith

Hughie Lee-Smith, "Self-Portrait," Oil on canvas, 24 x 20 in., National Academy of Design, New York
Hughie Lee-Smith, "Self-Portrait," Oil on canvas, 24 x 20 in., National Academy of Design, New York

ABOUT THE EVENT

Gallery Talk | "For America," Seeing and Meaning: The Self Portrait by Hughie Lee-Smith

Join guest speaker Alona Cooper Wilson, Ph.D. for a special Gallery Talk, examining the works by the first two African-American artists to be accepted to the National Academy of Design: Henry Ossawa Tanner, who was made an associate member in 1909, and Hughie Lee-Smith, who would follow Tanner in 1963. A surrealist whose work featured isolated figures in vast landscapes, this talk will focus primarily on two of Lee-Smith's paintings currently on view, The Beach and his self-portrait.

Alona Cooper Wilson received her Ph.D. in the History of Art and Architecture from Boston University. She has held positions as Director of Collections and Exhibitions and Chief Curator for the Museum of African American History in Boston and Nantucket, Assistant Director and Curator at The Amistad Center for Art and Culture at the Wadsworth Atheneum Museum of Art, and Manager of the Cunningham Center for the Study of Prints, Drawings, and Photographs at the Smith College Museum of Art. She has curated museum exhibits about art as well as history and written about African American artists including Richard Yarde and Charles White. Her essay, “Beyond the Surface: Hughie Lee-Smith,” is published in the book For America: Paintings from the National Academy of Design (Yale 2019). Currently, she is working on a manuscript about the art and social activism of Hughie Lee-Smith.

Admission

Free with Museum admission

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