The interest towards this topic has spread continuously over
the past century, starting from a restricted circle of academic scholars and spreading globally over the years due to the boom of social media, through the pages and platforms of digital activists
In the 1960s, as a response to segregation in the United States, the influential art patron Dominique de Menil began a research project and photo archive called The Image of the Black in Western Art. In 1994 their project was handed over to the Du Bois Institute of Harvard University which archives 26,000 photographs of artworks in all media, and offers expanded access to outside researchers with the publication of the Harvard University complete ten books series “The Image of the Black in Western Art”.
In 2013, “Revealing the African Presence in Renaissance Europe” has been an exhibition featuring over 65 paintings organized by the Walters Art Museum, Baltimore, in collaboration with the Princeton University Art Museum, with support from the National Endowment for the Humanities.
In 2015, Black Portraitures[S] became an international conference series organized by New York University and Harvard University in different cities: New York, Cambridge, Paris, Lisbon, Florence, Toronto, Newark, Havana.
In 2020 Uffizi Gallery in Florence launched On Being Present-Recovering Blackness in the Uffizi Galleries a virtual gallery of African presences in the world-famous masterpieces exhibited in both the Statue and Painting Gallery in the Uffizi and in the Palatine Gallery in the Pitti Palace. In the same year The Rembrandt House Museum in Amsterdam organized "Black in Rembrandt's Time". Guest-curated by Stephanie Archangel and Elmer Kolfin, the exhibition unites artworks from all over Europe.
In the same year The Rembrandt House Museum in Amsterdam organized "Black in Rembrandt's Time". Guest-curated by Stephanie Archangel and Elmer Kolfin, the exhibition unites artworks from all over Europe.
RaceB4Race, supported by the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation and Arizona State University, is an ongoing conference series and professional network community by and for scholars of color working on issues of race in premodern literature, history, and culture.
In 2021 the King’s College in London hosted the exhibition ‘Visible Skin: Rediscovering the Renaissance Through Black Portraiture. “Renaissance Skin" is a 5-year research project funded by a Wellcome Trust Senior Investigator Award. Based at King’s College London, the project is led by Professor Evelyn Welch.
In 2023, the Metropolitan Museum in New York hosted an exhibition which offers an unprecedented look at the life and artistic achievements of Afro-Hispanic painter Juan de Pareja.
a list of books
