Front page photo credit: Sonya Tanae Fort "Side View, 2021.

Framingham State University’s Danforth Art Museum has teamed up with FSU’s Center for Inclusive Excellence on a special display of five beautiful pieces of art created by Black artists.

The exhibition will be up in the Center for Inclusive Excellence, located in O’Connor Hall, throughout February, as part of FSU’s Black History Month celebrations.

“FSU is fortunate to be home to a fantastic museum, which creates really wonderful opportunities for us to partner on exhibitions,” says Jerome Burke, Director of the Center for Inclusive Excellence. “These five pieces were created by some remarkable black artists and we are proud to have them on display at the CIE this month.”

Rachel Passannante, the Collections Manager at Danforth Art Museum, collaborated with the CIE to select the images and artists to feature in the exhibition.

They include (work of art in parentheses):

Allan Rohan Crite (Madonna and Child, 1940 Brass, wood) was an African-American artist born on March 20, 1910, and he passed away on September 6, 2007. He was known for his significant contributions to the art world, particularly as a painter and illustrator. Crite's work often focused on themes related to African-American life, culture, and spirituality.

Winfred Rembert, (Miss Prather's Class, 2014 Woodcut, silkscreen on BFK Rives paper) an African-American artist born in 1945 and passed away in 2021, created the artwork "Miss Prather's Class" in 2014. Rembert was known for his unique and intricate leather carvings that depicted scenes from his life and the African-American experience.

Faith Ringgold (The Sunflower Quilting Bee at Arles, 1996 Lithograph on paper) was born Faith Jones on October 8, 1930, in New York City. She has created art centered around her own experience as a Black Woman her entire life and started making quilts in the 1980s.  Quilts are an innovative and creative way to pass stories and lessons down. This print is based on a quilt with the same image.

Sonya Tanae Fort (Side View, 2021, Photograph) is an African-American artist from Brockton, MA. She finds joy in photographing “the mundane” and finds the rawest moments the most interesting to capture. She did not pick up a camera until adulthood, in 2014 she was mentored by collector Martha Tepper Takayama, and since then her works have been featured internationally and here in Framingham.  Side View won third prize in the Danforth Annual Juried Exhibition in 2022, before it was acquired for the permanent collection.

Sacha Tebo (Red Bird, 1968 Encaustic on flour sack) is a Haitian artist who was born in 1934 and passed away in May of 2004. Tebo is memorialized by his use of Haitian culture as his art and sculptors, and his care for environmental reform.

To learn more about the amazing artwork at Framingham State University’s Danforth Art Museum, visit danforth.framingham.edu.