Simone Leigh is Powerful Art Personified
Simone Leigh makes mixed media-sculptures and installations, as well as videos, through which she foregrounds the beauty and complexity of blackness. Claiming to “continue to revel” in her own identity as an African-American woman, she unflinchingly explores how black bodies have been discussed and displayed throughout history. Clay, in the form of terra cotta and […]
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Photographer Bruce Talamon and his book “Soul. R&B. Funk. Photographs 1972–1982” show us black love and music!
Get down with such legends as Marvin Gaye, Earth, Wind & Fire, Stevie Wonder, Donna Summer, the Jackson Five, Diana Ross, James Brown, and Chaka Khan in this collection of largely unseen images from the golden age of soul, R&B, and funk. This XL volume gathers all of the glamour and groove captured by photographer Bruce W. Talamon. Bruce W. Talamon saw it all during the golden age of […]
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Black Joy and Resistance – Book of Images by Adreinne Waheed
This gorgeous book of images reveals an intimate glimpse of Black Joy and how we resist. Through Waheed’s unique lens the viewer experiences Black Joy and Resistance during Dance Africa at Brooklyn Academy of Music, Carnival in Salvador Bahia, Afro Punk in Brooklyn, in South Africa – The Fees Must Fall Student Protest in Johannesburg, […]
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Zanele Muholi: ‘Somnyama Ngonyama, Hail the Dark Lioness’ – Visual Activism Undaunted
Zanele Muholi was born in Durban, in 1972, and lives in Johannesburg. She co-founded the Forum for Empowerment of Women in 2002, and in 2009 founded Inkanyiso, a forum for queer and visual (activist) media. Muholi’s self-proclaimed mission is ‘to re-write a black queer and trans visual history of South Africa for the world to […]
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Learn More about Adeyemi Michael (British-Nigerian filmmaker) & his outstanding short film aptly named “ENTITLED”
Adeyemi Michael is a Grierson and Al Jezeera New Horizon award-winning filmmaker/artist. An MA Directing graduate from the NFTS; made a Broadcast Hotshot in 2014, his breakout film Sodiq gained several accolades including premiering at Sheffield Doc Fest along with nominations from the IDA (US) to RTS (UK) awards (read more) Adeyemi Michael’s film “ENTITLED” […]
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Kimberly M Becoat has carved out an important road in the shifting landscape of Art
Kimberly M. Becoat is a contemporary mixed media artist whose work is a stylistic abstraction with a conceptual investigation of new materials and visual experiences with social commentary. She uses a variety of art materials including acrylic paint, Sumi ink, and watercolor as well as less conventional items like sand, tar paper, foil, candy wrappers, and […]
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“Becoming” by Michelle Obama –The Book and Tour Info
Warm, wise, and revelatory, Becoming is the deeply personal reckoning of a woman of soul and substance who has steadily defied expectations—and whose story inspires us to do the same read more Who isn’t looking forward to this event? Get more information re: presale of the book and the tour @ BECOMING MICHELLE OBAMA We […]
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Featured Book: Whitewalling: Art, Race & Protest in 3 Acts by Aruna D’Souza
In 2017, the Whitney Biennial included a painting by a white artist, Dana Schutz, of the lynched body of a young black child, Emmett Till. In 1979, anger brewed over a show at New York’s Artists Space entitled The Nigger Drawings. In 1969, the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s exhibition Harlem on My Mind did not […]
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Featured Event: Barron Claiborne “ILLUMINADOS” The Luminous Black Saints — Photo Exhibition August 24th – September 9th, 2018 in New York City
The images in this exhibition comprise 33 photographs shot by Barron Claiborne in 8 x 10 Polaroid format, starting in 2001. The series includes Saints (Muurmaidens and Orisha’s) Venus Aurea (The Female Form), the Twins (Double Duplication), and Cara Negra (Black Face). This collaboration with +81 Gallery will offer Limited Edition products featuring Barron Claiborne’s […]
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Mustafa Shakir is excellent as Luke Cage’s Bushmaster and so much more!
Ok, so I am immensely inspired to write a little bit about Mustafa Shakir. He has been on my radar to share his light with you, the readers of Nevah Black Down for some time. I’ve personally known him because of the whole spoken word scene in NYC over the years. I’ve always thought he […]
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Speaking to America! Music, Image, Voice and Words
We have seen, heard and felt what has been happening in America for some time now. People are talking, crying and imagining something different. We here love when artists put themselves out there for the cause. Joey Bada$$ and Childish Gambino , like them or not, boldly reach within and take a chance on speaking their […]
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Proud To Be Black, Spoken Word by Karen Gibson Roc
I wrote this piece some years ago when I was trying to navigate the terrain of a new environment. Moving from Toronto to NYC gave me a window into things and ideas I had never been privy to. Just a border kept me disconnected with a part of myself that longed to experience both the […]
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An animated excerpt of an article from W.E.B. Du Bois depicts the alienation experienced by African Americans
“Between me and the other world, there is ever an unasked question: How does it feel to be a problem?” That’s W.E.B. Du Bois, sociologist, historian, writer, and one of the co-founders of the NAACP, writing for The Atlantic in 1897. His article, “Strivings of the Negro People,”addresses the alienation experienced by emancipated slaves and […]
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Erin Robinson: Her art is bright, beautiful and full of purpose!
Creative Visionary Erin Robinson is a Fashion Designer by trade but also a trained fine artist from Parsons School of Design and the Corcoran School of Art. Her daydreamy, magical imagination is inspired by travel, color, texture, the feminine shape and the many shades and coifs of Brooklyn. She works in a variety of mediums […]
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Kimberly Durdin: Catching Babies for her Community
It was a Saturday afternoon when I walked into the sacred space of RA MA East located in the West Adams area of Los Angeles. I was there to meet and do a piece on Kimberly Durdin, who is a Los Angeles based IBCLC (International Board Certified Lactation Consultant), Doula, Childbirth Educator and Student Midwife. […]
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Joshua June –a photographer with an eye for the truth!
Every now and again you come across a photographer that makes you want to be in front of his or her camera, Joshua is one of those artists. I met him some years ago and I have had the pleasure of working with him. His kind and gentle nature make him a person you want […]
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What I Wasn’t Taught In School – A Spoken Word Short Film Questioning Black History Month!
This piece is absolutely amazing! SAMUEL KING is talented and powerful! It was posted some years ago and of course it is still relevant today, it addresses questions about black history month! Check it out! Nevahblackdown
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Featured Book/Video/Event: Black Girl Magic: A Poem by Mahogany L. Brown
Black Girl, they say you ain’t ‘posed to be here Much of what twenty-first-century culture tells black girls they are not pretty: Don’t wear this; don’t smile at that. Don’t have an opinion; don’t dream big. And most of all, don’t love yourself. In response to such destructive ideas, internationally recognized poet Mahogany Browne challenges […]
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Featured Event: Something to look forward to Saturday, February 24th, 2018 8:00pm @ The Apollo Theater, NYC “SOUNDTRACK ’63”
A Live Musical Documentary with spirituals, protest songs, and current popular music performed by an 18-piece orchestra, created by Brooklyn’s Soul Science Lab. From the painful conditions that ignited the 1963 Civil Rights Movement to today’s Black Lives Matter Movement, and much triumphant progress in between, music has always strengthened outcries for justice. This concert […]
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Beautiful Brown Skin – A Poem by Karen Gibson Roc
I AM THAT LITTLE GIRL CLOTHED IN BEAUTIFUL BROWN SKIN SMILING FROM BEHIND GROWN UP EYES WANTING ONLY TO ERASE THE TIES TO THE DECEIPT THAT CAUSES HATE AND A DESTRUCTIVE RISE – ING ON HIGH NESTS ABOVE THE REST — WITHIN THIS TIME LOVE IS WEEPING FROM THE UNTYING THE COMPARING COLOR OF SKIN […]
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