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SUMMARY:Dawoud Bey: Elegy Weekend Symposium
DESCRIPTION:Join us for a day celebrating and engaging with the newly opened exhibition Dawoud Bey: Elegy. We are honored to feature this day of discussion in NOMA’s Lapis Center for the Arts with local and visiting artists (including American photographer Dawoud Bey)\, curators\, historians\, and activists.  \nThe afternoon’s first panel will feature artist Dawoud Bey; Valerie Cassel Oliver\, the Sydney and Frances Lewis Family Curator of Modern and Contemporary Art at the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts; and LeRonn Brooks\, Associate Curator\, Modern and Contemporary Collections at the Getty Research Institute\, in a conversation around the exhibition and catalogue.  \nThe second panel highlights Kathe Hambrick\, Executive of the Director Amistad Research Center and Founder of The River Road African American Museum; Jo Banner and Dr Joy Banner\, Co-Founders of The Descendants Project; for a discussion centering the land of Louisiana and\, its history\, present and future.  \nThe day culminates in a catalogue signing.  \nThis program is free and open to all. Advance registration is recommended.  \nRegister Now \nIn order to view the exhibition Dawoud Bey: Elegy\, a museum admission ticket is required. Tickets can be purchased at the admissions desk  in the Great Hall or online. \n\nProgram Details\nDawoud Bey: Elegy Catalogue Contributor Panel | 1:00-2:00pm\nFeaturing artist Dawoud Bey; Valerie Cassel Oliver\, the Sydney and Frances Lewis Family Curator of Modern and Contemporary Art at the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts; and LeRonn Brooks\, Associate Curator\, Modern and Contemporary Collections at the Getty Research Institute. Moderated by Brian Piper. \nIntermission | 2:00-2:30pm\nPanel Discussion | 2:30-3:30pm\nFeaturing Kathe Hambrick\, Director of the Amistad Research Center and Founder of the River Road African American Museum; and Jo Banner and Dr. Joy Banner\, founders and directors of the Descendants Project and Woodland Plantation. Moderated by Kristina Kay Robinson. \nDawoud Bey: Elegy exhibition catalogue signing with Bey\, Cassel Oliver\, and Brooks | 3:30 – 4:15 pm\nCafe NOMA\, which is adjacent to the Lapis Center for the Arts\, will be open for food and beverage purchases throughout the afternoon \n\nAbout the Participants\nAbout Dawoud Bey\nAmerican photographer Dawoud Bey\, photo by Frank Ishman \nGroundbreaking artist and MacArthur Fellow Dawoud Bey examines the Black past and present. His photographs and film installations have been exhibited in museums and galleries throughout the United States and Europe. Bey’s work has been the subject of numerous solo museum exhibitions\, including Dawoud Bey: An American Project organized by the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art and the Whitney Museum of American Art (2020-2022)\, and Elegy at the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts (2023-2024) and New Orleans Museum of Art (2025-2026); and Dawoud Bey: Street Portraits at the Denver Art Museum (2024-2025). He has been the subject of several monographs\, including Elegy (Aperture/VMFA\, 2023)\, which chronicles Bey’s history projects and landscape-based work. Bey is the recipient of numerous awards including five honorary doctorates\, and in 2024\, the artist was inducted into the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.  \nBey lives and works in Chicago and New York. He is currently a Critic at Yale University\, where he received his Masters in Fine Arts\, and is Professor Emeritus at Columbia College\, Chicago.   \nAbout Valerie Cassel Oliver\nSydney and Frances Lewis Family Curator of Modern and Contemporary Art at the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts Valerie Cassel Oliver \nValerie Cassel Oliver is the Sydney and Frances Lewis Family Curator of Modern and Contemporary Art at the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts. Prior to this role\, she served as a senior curator at the Contemporary Arts Museum Houston\, Texas; director of the Visiting Artist Program at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago; and program specialist at the National Endowment for the Arts. In 2000\, she was one of six curators selected to organize the Whitney Museum of American Art’s Biennial. Cassel Oliver has organized several special exhibitions at VMFA\, including Howardena Pindell: What Remains To Be Seen (2018)\, Cosmologies from the Tree of Life: Art from the African American South (2019)\, The Dirty South: Contemporary Art\, Material Culture\, and the Sonic Impulse (2021) and Isaac Julien: Lessons of the Hour—Frederick Douglass (2022). In addition\, she has produced an installation series\, Lewis Focus\, that has featured the work of Theaster Gates\, Athena LaTocha\, Annabeth Rosen and Ebony Patterson \nAbout LeRonn Brooks\nDr. LeRonn P. Brooks\, curator of modern and contemporary collections\, and the African American Art History Initiative (AAAHI)\, at the Getty Research Institute \nDr. LeRonn P. Brooks is an art historian and curator of modern and contemporary collections\, and the African American Art History Initiative (AAAHI)\, at the Getty Research Institute. Brooks is curator of African American collections and acquisitions at the GRI. He is responsible for building and developing collections to promote advanced research in the study of African American art history. In his capacity at the GRI\, Brooks is also the curator\, and co-curator\, of several archives including those of the Johnson Publishing Company\, architect Paul Revere Williams\, sculptor Richard Hunt\, interdisciplinary artist\, Maren Hassinger\, and scholar Dr. Robert Farris Thompson\, among others. His interviews and essays on African American art\, and poetry\, have been featured in Callaloo Journal\, The International Review of African American Art\, and the Aperture Foundation\, as well as numerous exhibition catalogues. Brooks earned a Doctor of Philosophy\, Art History\, from City University of New York\, NY\, and a Bachelor of Fine Arts (Painting) from Hunter College\, NY. \nAbout Jo Banner\nJo Banner\, Founder and Director of The Descendants Project \nJo Banner is the founder and director of The Descendants Project\, a nonprofit she co-founded with her twin sister\, Dr. Joy Banner\, in St. John the Baptist Parish\, Louisiana. Holding bachelor’s and master’s degrees in communications\, she uses her education to honor the legacy of enslaved people while defending descendant communities.Jo’s mission includes preserving the burial grounds of the enslaved and protecting the last 11 miles untouched by industrial development in Cancer Alley. Through her work\, she envisions a just transition for people and land to achieve economic and environmental liberation. \nAbout Dr. Joy Banner\nDr. Joy banner\, Co-Founder and Co-Director of The Descendants Project \nDr. Joy Banner is the Co-Founder and Co-Director of The Descendants Project\, a nonprofit organization founded to protect the health\, land\, and lives of the Black descendant community in Louisiana’s River Parishes—an area known as “Cancer Alley.”After earning her Ph.D. in communications and B.S. in marketing from Louisiana State University\, Dr. Banner taught business communications\, marketing and entrepreneurship at LSU\, where she advanced to Chair of the Management program before returning to her hometown of Wallace\, Louisiana. Joy has 20+ years in heritage and tourism\, which she has leveraged to champion the preservation of Black historic sites\, heritage\, and communities. \nAbout Kathe Hambrick\nKathe Hambrick\, Executive Director of the Amistad Research Center \nKathe Hambrick is the Executive Director of the Amistad Research Center\, where she brings over 30 years of experience in public history\, curation\, and interpretation to preserve and share pivotal narratives of America’s ethnic and racial history. As the founder of the River Road African American Museum in Louisiana\, Hambrick has championed the preservation of African American history in the Mississippi River parishes. She holds a Master’s in Museum Studies from Southern University at New Orleans (SUNO) and has curated over 100 exhibits\, including “The Rural Roots of Jazz.” A published author and consultant\, she continues to shape a more inclusive historical narrative through her work. \nAbout Kristina Kay Robinson\nKristina Kay Robinson\, poet\, writer\, independent curator and visual artist \nKristina Kay Robinson is a poet\, writer\, independent curator and visual artist born and raised in New Orleans\, Louisiana. Her writing in various genres has appeared in Art in America\, Harper’s Bazaar\, Guernica\, The Baffler\, The Nation\, The Massachusetts Review and Elle among other outlets. Robinson is a recipient of the Rabkin Prize for Visual Arts Journalism and an Andy Warhol Arts Writing grant. Currently she serves as the New Orleans editor at large for the Atlanta based\, Burnaway magazine. \nAbout the Amistad Research Center \nThe Amistad Research Center is the nation’s oldest\, largest\, and most comprehensive independent archives specializing in the history of African Americans and other ethnic minorities. The Center is dedicated to preserving this history by providing a home to manuscripts\, photographs\, books\, periodicals\, and works of art that bear witness to a post worth sharing with the future. \nAbout The Descendants Project\nThe Descendants Project is an emerging organization committed to the intergenerational healing and flourishing of the Black descendant community in the Louisiana river parishes. The lands of the river parishes hold the intersecting histories of enslavement\, settler colonialism\, and environmental degradation.\n​\nWe are descended from the enslaved men\, women\, and children who were forced to labor at one or more of the hundreds of plantations that line the Mississippi River from New Orleans to Baton Rouge. Starting in the 1970s\, large industrial  petrochemical plants began purchasing the land of these plantations still surrounded by vulnerable Black descendant communities. The region is now known as “Cancer Alley” for the extreme risks of cancer and death due to pollution. The community faces many other problems such as food insecurity\, high unemployment\, high poverty\, land dispossession\, and health issues that stem from a culture of disregard for Black communities and their quality of life.\n​​\nThrough programming\, education\, advocacy\, and outreach\, The Descendants Project is committed to reversing the vagrancies of slavery through healing and restorative work. We aim to eliminate the narrative violence of plantation tourism and champion the voice of the Black descendant community while demanding action that supports the total well-being of Black descendants. \nAbout the River Road African American Museum \nThe mission of the River Road African American Museum (RRAAM) is to educate visitors about the history and culture of African Americans in the rural communities of south Louisiana through the collection\, preservation\, and interpretation of art\, artifacts\, and historic buildings. \nAbout Dawoud Bey: Elegy\nDawoud Bey: Elegy draws upon the factual and imagined realities of the early African American presence in the United States. Including forty-five black-and-white photographs and two film installations\, the exhibition elucidates the deeply profound historical memory still embedded in geography at historically significant sites in Virginia\, Louisiana and Ohio. Through the interweaving of three photographic series—”Stony the Road “(2023)\, “In This Here Place” (2019)\, and “Night Coming Tenderly\, Black” (2017)—Bey offers a framework through which to conceptualize the landscapes of Virginia\, Louisiana\, and Ohio (respectively) through images that convey the memories of our shared American past. \nLearn More
URL:https://noma.org/event/dawoud-bey-elegy-weekend-symposium/
LOCATION:NOMA’s Lapis Center for the Arts
CATEGORIES:Special
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DTSTART;TZID=America/Chicago:20251118T173000
DTEND;TZID=America/Chicago:20251118T193000
DTSTAMP:20260520T165356
CREATED:20251030T161811Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20251103T205410Z
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SUMMARY:"Hurricanes Katrina and Rita at 20: Poets Remember" with Creative Assembly Resident Andy Young and Louisiana Poet Laureate (2021-2023) Mona Lisa Saloy
DESCRIPTION:Join NOMA Creative Assembly resident Andy Young and former Louisiana Poet Laureate Mona Lisa Saloy for a conversation about poetry and art in connection with the new anthology Hurricanes Katrina and Rita: An Anthology of Louisiana Poetry with Art. This program commemorates Hurricanes Katrina and Rita and celebrates the new anthology edited by Louisiana Poets Laureate Mona Lisa Saloy and John Warner Smith. Dr. Saloy will be featured along with contributing poet Andy Young\, who is a member of the 2025 NOMA Creative Assembly Cohort. \nThis conversation will be followed by a book signing where guests can purchase copies of Hurricanes Katrina and Rita: An Anthology of Louisiana Poetry with Art and have them signed.  \nThis program is free and open to the public. Advance registration is recommended. \nRegister Now \n\n\nAbout Andy Young\n \nAndy Young‘s second full-length collection\, Museum of the Soon to Depart\, was published by Carnegie Mellon University Press (2025). She is also the author of All Night It Is Morning (Diálogos Press\, 2014) and four chapbooks. She grew up in West Virginia and has lived most of her adult life in New Orleans\, where she teaches at New Orleans Center for Creative Arts. Her work has recently appeared in Prairie Schooner and Blue Mountain Review\, and her short film\, “Pharmacy Museum Tour Guide\, New Orleans” was recently screened at New Orleans Film Festival\, the Ó Bhéal Poetry Film Festival\, and has won awards from the Berlin Indie Film Awards\, London Women Film Festival and others. She is a graduate of the Warren Wilson Program for Writers. \nAbout Mona Lisa Saloy\nLouisiana Poet Laureate (2021-2023) Mona Lisa Saloy \nMona Lisa Saloy\, Ph.D.\, Louisiana Poet Laureate (2021-2023)\, is an author\, folklorist\, Louisiana Folklife Commissioner\, educator\, and scholar of Creole culture in articles\, documentaries\, and poems about Black New Orleans before and after Katrina. Saloy is currently Conrad N. Hilton Endowed Professor of English\, Dillard University.  Mona Lisa Saloy writes for those who don’t or can’t tell Black Creole cultural stories. Learn more at www.monalisasaloy.com \nBooks: Red Beans & Ricely Yours (has a banned poem “The N Word”)\, won the T.S. Eliot Prize and the PEN/Oakland Josephine Miles Award. Second Line Home\, on New Orleans Black Creole culture.\n\n\nRecent publications: The Chicago Quarterly Review\, Vol 33; “Introduction” to Black Fire!!! This Time II; Southern Voices: Fifty Contemporary Poets (Tom Mack & Andrew Geyer eds.) Literary Press\, Lamar University\, Fall 2024.  LMNL Poetry Anthology\, Fall 2024. Black Creole Chronicles: Poems (UNO Press 2023)\, choice for ONE BOOK ONE NEW ORLEANS 2024\, & Book of the Month\, The Whitney Plantation Museum.\n\n\nSaloy was named Louisianian of the Year in Literature: 2024 in Louisiana Life Magazine. Mentioned in “Read your Way through New Orleans\,” by Maurice Carlos Ruffin\, NYT Book Review\, Oct. 2024\n\n\n\n\nAbout Creative Assembly\nLaunched in 2021\, NOMA’s Creative Assembly residency promotes community engagement by welcoming artists to collaborate throughout the year with the museum’s permanent collection\, special exhibitions\, and programs. Creative Assembly Cohort members are provided funds and museum support to develop artistic projects and public offerings\, like programs and workshops. \nLearn more at noma.org/learn/creative-assembly/.
URL:https://noma.org/event/katrina-and-rita-poets-remember/
LOCATION:NOMA’s Lapis Center for the Arts
CATEGORIES:Talks & Tours,Creative Assembly
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BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Chicago:20260114T123000
DTEND;TZID=America/Chicago:20260114T130000
DTSTAMP:20260520T165356
CREATED:20251216T194840Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20251216T194840Z
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SUMMARY:Gallery Talk and Book Signing with Boyce Upholt\, Author of The Great River
DESCRIPTION:Every week\, NOMA hosts gallery talks in the museum and the Besthoff Sculpture Garden led by curators\, artists\, and other special guests. These lively\, participatory conversations provide a moment to take a close look at one work—or a selection of works—currently on view. \nJoin the NOMA Book Club in welcoming local author Boyce Upholt for two gallery talks connecting his book The Great River: The Making and Unmaking of the Mississippi with NOMA’s special exhibition Nicolas Floc’h: Fleuves-Océan\, Mississippi Watershed. The gallery talks will be offered at 12:30 and 6 pm this day. This program will also include a book signing with Upholt.  \nIncluded with museum admission\, which is free for Louisiana residents every Wednesday courtesy of The Helis Foundation’s Art for All initiative. When you arrive at NOMA\, check in at the admissions desk for directions to the appropriate location.
URL:https://noma.org/event/gallery-talk-upholt/2026-01-14/1/
LOCATION:New Orleans Museum of Art\, 1 Collins Diboll Circle\, New Orleans\, LA\, 70119
CATEGORIES:Book Club,Talks & Tours
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BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Chicago:20260114T180000
DTEND;TZID=America/Chicago:20260114T183000
DTSTAMP:20260520T165356
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SUMMARY:Gallery Talk and Book Signing with Boyce Upholt\, Author of The Great River
DESCRIPTION:Every week\, NOMA hosts gallery talks in the museum and the Besthoff Sculpture Garden led by curators\, artists\, and other special guests. These lively\, participatory conversations provide a moment to take a close look at one work—or a selection of works—currently on view. \nJoin the NOMA Book Club in welcoming local author Boyce Upholt for two gallery talks connecting his book The Great River: The Making and Unmaking of the Mississippi with NOMA’s special exhibition Nicolas Floc’h: Fleuves-Océan\, Mississippi Watershed. The gallery talks will be offered at 12:30 and 6 pm this day. This program will also include a book signing with Upholt.  \nIncluded with museum admission\, which is free for Louisiana residents every Wednesday courtesy of The Helis Foundation’s Art for All initiative. When you arrive at NOMA\, check in at the admissions desk for directions to the appropriate location.
URL:https://noma.org/event/gallery-talk-upholt/2026-01-14/2/
LOCATION:New Orleans Museum of Art\, 1 Collins Diboll Circle\, New Orleans\, LA\, 70119
CATEGORIES:Book Club,Talks & Tours
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END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Chicago:20260114T180000
DTEND;TZID=America/Chicago:20260114T183000
DTSTAMP:20260520T165356
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SUMMARY:Gallery Talk and Book Signing with Boyce Upholt\, Author of The Great River
DESCRIPTION:Every week\, NOMA hosts gallery talks in the museum and the Besthoff Sculpture Garden led by curators\, artists\, and other special guests. These lively\, participatory conversations provide a moment to take a close look at one work—or a selection of works—currently on view. \nJoin the NOMA Book Club in welcoming local author Boyce Upholt for two gallery talks connecting his book The Great River: The Making and Unmaking of the Mississippi with NOMA’s special exhibition Nicolas Floc’h: Fleuves-Océan\, Mississippi Watershed. The gallery talks will be offered at 12:30 and 6 pm this day. This program will also include a book signing with Upholt.  \nIncluded with museum admission\, which is free for Louisiana residents every Wednesday courtesy of The Helis Foundation’s Art for All initiative. When you arrive at NOMA\, check in at the admissions desk for directions to the appropriate location.
URL:https://noma.org/event/gallery-talk-upholt-2/2026-01-14/
LOCATION:New Orleans Museum of Art\, 1 Collins Diboll Circle\, New Orleans\, LA\, 70119
CATEGORIES:Book Club,Talks & Tours
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DTSTART;TZID=America/Chicago:20260115T120000
DTEND;TZID=America/Chicago:20260115T130000
DTSTAMP:20260520T165356
CREATED:20260105T160733Z
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SUMMARY:Book Club: The Great River: The Making and Unmaking of the Mississippi
DESCRIPTION:NOMA’s book club meets monthly to discuss fiction and non-fiction books related to art in the museum’s collection and exhibitions. \nThis month’s book club selection is The Great River: The Making and Unmaking of the Mississippi by Boyce Upholt\,  a landmark work of natural history in which Upholt tells the epic story of the wild and unruly Mississippi River and the centuries spent attempting to control it. \nRegister Now \nThis month’s book club will also be paired with two gallery talks where Upholt will connect his work in The Great River with the works on view in the exhibition Nicolas Floc’h: Fleuves-Océan\, Mississippi Watershed and sign copies of The Great River for attendees. \nView Upholt Gallery Talk and Book Signing Events \n\nAbout NOMA’s Book Club\nNOMA’s book club is an informal group open to anyone on a month-to-month basis. You do not have to attend every meeting or read every book to participate. In addition to monthly book discussions\, the book club meets periodically for curatorial programs related to the book selections.  \nBooks are selected in advance and planned according to the museum’s exhibition schedule. Participants are expected to procure their own copy of the titles. Selections are also available at the NOMA Museum Shop\, where museum members receive a 10% discount. \nMeetings are held in person or via Zoom. All meetings begin at 12 pm. For more information or questions\, please email programs@noma.org. \n\nAbout the Book\nThe Great River: The Making and Unmaking of the Mississippi\nWinner of the 2024 Willie Morris Award for Southern Nonfiction • A Chicago Public Library Must-Read Book of 2024 • A Booklist Editors’ Choice \nThe Mississippi River lies at the heart of America\, an undeniable life force that is intertwined with the nation’s culture and history. Its watershed spans almost half the country\, Mark Twain’s travels on the river inspired our first national literature\, and jazz and blues were born in its floodplains and carried upstream. \nIn this landmark work of natural history\, Boyce Upholt tells the epic story of this wild and unruly river\, and the centuries of efforts to control it. Over thousands of years\, the Mississippi watershed was home to millions of Indigenous people who regarded “the great river” with awe and respect\, adorning its banks with astonishing spiritual earthworks. The river was ever-changing\, and Indigenous tribes embraced and even depended on its regular flooding. But the expanse of the watershed and the rich soils of its floodplain lured European settlers and American pioneers\, who had a different vision: the river was a foe to conquer. \nCenturies of human attempts to own\, contain\, and rework the Mississippi River\, from Thomas Jefferson’s expansionist land hunger through today’s era of environmental concern\, have now transformed its landscape. Upholt reveals how an ambitious and sometimes contentious program of engineering—government-built levees\, jetties\, dikes\, and dams—has not only damaged once-vibrant ecosystems but may not work much longer. Carrying readers along the river’s last remaining backchannels\, he explores how scientists are now hoping to restore what has been lost. \nRich and powerful\, The Great River delivers a startling account of what happens when we try to fight against nature instead of acknowledging and embracing its power—a lesson that is all too relevant in our rapidly changing world. \n-description from W.W. Norton & Company \nAbout Boyce Upholt\n \n  \n  \n  \n  \n  \n  \n  \n  \n  \n  \n  \n\n\n\n\n\n  \nBoyce Upholt is a journalist and essayist whose writing has appeared in the Atlantic\, National Geographic\, the Oxford American\, and Virginia Quarterly Review\, among other publications. He is the winner of a James Beard Award for investigative journalism\, and he lives in New Orleans\, Louisiana.
URL:https://noma.org/event/book-club-the-great-river-the-making-and-unmaking-of-the-mississippi/
LOCATION:New Orleans Museum of Art\, 1 Collins Diboll Circle\, New Orleans\, LA\, 70119
CATEGORIES:Book Club
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BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Chicago:20260211T173000
DTEND;TZID=America/Chicago:20260211T203000
DTSTAMP:20260520T165356
CREATED:20260105T190052Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20260120T185647Z
UID:10000854-1770831000-1770841800@noma.org
SUMMARY:Harmonia Rosales and CCH Pounder: Conversation and Book Signing Celebrating Chronicles of Ori: An African Epic
DESCRIPTION:NOMA is delighted to welcome acclaimed artist Harmonia Rosales in celebration of her new book\, Chronicles of Ori: An African Epic.  \nThe evening opens with a book signing\, followed by a moderated conversation between Rosales and actress and art collector CCH Pounder. This conversation will be moderated by Dr. Redell Hearn\, NOMA’s Chief Educator. \nThis program is free and open to the public; copies of Chronicles of Ori are available for purchase through the NOMA Museum Shop during the program. Registration is highly encouraged. Seating is limited\, but standing room will be available. Registration does not guarantee having a physical seat for the program.  \nREGISTER HERE \nThis program is in conjunction with NOMA’s Book Club. Join us on February 5th for a discussion on Chronicles of Ori: An African Epic. \nView Event Listing \n\nProgram Schedule\n5:30 PM | Book Signing with Harmonia Rosales in the Coleman Courtyard \nThe NOMA Museum Shop will have copies of Chronicles of Ori: An African Epic available for purchase. \n6:30 – 8:30 pm| Conversation with Harmonia Rosales and CCH Pounder in NOMA’s Lapis Center for the Arts\nConversation moderated by NOMA’s Chief Educator\, Dr. Redell Hearn\, in the Lapis Center for the Arts. \n\nAbout the Speakers and Chronicles of Ori: An African Epic\nHarmonia Rosales\nHarmonia Rosales\, Artist and Author of Chronicles of Ori: An African Epic \n  \n  \n  \n  \n  \n  \n  \n  \n  \n  \n  \n\nHarmonia Rosales is a Chicago-born\, Afro-Cuban American artist and author whose work centers the visibility and empowerment of Black women in Western art. Growing up visiting the Art Institute of Chicago\, Rosales was captivated by Renaissance painting – but years later\, her daughter’s simple observation that “they don’t look like me” exposed the exclusion at the heart of that tradition. That moment sparked Rosales’s artistic journey: reimagining Renaissance and Baroque masterpieces with Black protagonists and centering West African tradition.\n\nShe lives in Los Angeles\, CA.\n\nCCH Pounder\nActress and art collector CCH Pounder \n  \n  \n  \n  \n  \n  \n  \n  \n  \n  \n  \n  \n  \n  \nAward-winning actress CCH Pounder has been extensively involved with the arts as a patron\, collector\, gallery owner and museum founder. Ms. Pounder’s Collection consists of Caribbean and African artists and artists of the African Diaspora. The Collection\, which comprises over 500 pieces\, is heavily concentrated in the area of Contemporary Art but also includes traditional African sculptures. In 1992\, Ms. Pounder and her husband\, the late Boubacar Koné\, founded and built the Musée Boribana\, the first privately owned contemporary museum in Dakar Senegal\, which they gifted to that nation in 2014.  Numerous exhibits have been mounted featuring pieces from Ms. Pounder’s Collection including The Charles G. Wright Museum of African History in Detroit\, the DuSable Black History Museum and Education Center in Chicago\, the African American Museum in Philadelphia and the African Diaspora Art Museum of Atlanta. Other loans & exhibits have included the National Portrait Gallery in London\, Xavier University in New Orleans\, Kent State Museum\, Spelman College Museum of Art and Memphis Brooks Museum of Art\, among many others. \nChronicles of Ori: An African Epic\n \n  \n  \n  \n  \n  \n  \n  \n  \n  \n  \nIn Chronicles of Ori\, her debut book\, Harmonia Rosales retells the African myths she has long treasured\, crafting an enthralling epic that spans the birth of the universe to the modern world of colonialism and resistance. She writes of the powerful\, temperamental deities called the Orishas; of the founding of Yorubaland by the shrewd leader Oduduwa; of the young heroine Eve\, born in a time of violence and despair\, who would help her people regain their past splendor; and of shimmering serpents and monstrous shadows who stalk the lands of mortals. At the center of these linked tales is the bond\, sometimes fraying\, between the Orishas and the humans who worship them. It was the Orishas who made humans\, and who gave them their most precious resource: their Oris\, or destinies. Vividly brought to life by Rosales’s artwork\, Chronicles of Ori will enlighten and delight readers for years to come. \nNAACP IMAGE AWARDS Nominee for Outstanding Literary Work\, Fiction\nOne of Hyperallergic’s Favorite Art Books of 2025\n“[R]ichly evocative…a brilliant and beautiful volume.” —Booklist\, starred review\n“A lavish\, eye-catching rethinking of ages-old stories.” —Kirkus Reviews\, starred review
URL:https://noma.org/event/harmonia-rosales-cch-pounder-conversation-signing/
CATEGORIES:Special,Book Club,Talks & Tours
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