"WOROFILA Worofila Street: Building African Architecture" "The first book by Senegalese practice Worofila, bringing together their research processes and projects to suggest an approach to making in architecture in contemporary Africa This collection of critical texts and project presentations reflects on the legacy of colonialism in building practices in West Africa, and explores local pre-colonial histories to forge a contemporary bioclimatic and ecological architectural language Worofila are a celebrated emerging practice based in Dakar and headed by principals Nzinga B. Mboup and Nicolas Rondet, whose work has been widely exhibited and discussed" "This irst book by celebrated Senegalese practice Woroila addresses the challenge facing the African city of today: to build in a way that is adapted to the lives of cur- rent inhabitants without compromising those of future generations. Drawing on abundant but often ignored pre-colonial methods and models of building, Woroila create bioclimatic architecture based around local, non-polluting materials, ances- tral knowledge, and democratic systems of construction and maintenance. Their work moves beyond the legacy of colonial-era architecture, imposed from other cultures and climates and frequently ill-suited, to recover and develop a sustainable African architectural language that reflects the continent's climate, ecology, and identity. Worofila Street: Building African Architecture offers an overview of Woroila's proliic work to date, with detailed explorations of the research, ideas, and tech- niques that structure it. Texts on the histories of building in Senegal and the pre- and post-colonial conditions of architecture on the African continent are accompanied by presentations of projects spanning housing, public buildings, infrastructure, landscapes, and experiments with materials. Together these propose a new typol- ogy of building in Senegal and inspire approaches to develop local and sustainable architectures across the world." "WOROFILA are a Dakar-based architectural practice founded in 2019 and headed by Nzinga B. Mboup and Nicolas Rondet. Woroila specialises in bioclimatic architecture and construction using local materials such as raw earth and typha, with the aim of promoting an architecture that is durable and in harmony with the climate."

It Tells My Story is a gorgeously illustrated art book showcasing thirty-four quilts from the Yvonne Wells Collection at the International Quilt Museum at the University of Nebraska–Lincoln. Yvonne Wells is an acclaimed artist from Tuscaloosa, Alabama, whose narrative quilts are immediately recognizable. Using bright colors and bold designs, Wells’s quilts include references to biblical stories, the Civil Rights Movement, and moments from her life. Among the more than ten thousand objects in the International Quilt Museum permanent collection, Wells is the most represented artist.

Essays by quilt historians Teresa Duryea Wong, Carolyn Ducey, Kyra E. Hicks, and Sharbreon Plummer discuss Wells and her place in the art world. It Tells My Story highlights Wells’s most beloved quilt series, The Seven Deadly Sins, which Wells describes in her own words. The vibrancy and vitality of Wells’s creations are featured throughout the book, including the backs of many of Wells’s quilts, which have never been published before, bringing to life the extraordinary work of this renowned quilter.

This fascinating book provides the first assessment of the artists who have shaped the rich history of art in Texas, from its 19th-century origins to the diversity of the present scene. Published to accompany an exhibition of selected works from the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, this lavishly illustrated volume reveals the complexity of America's most fabled state as seen through the eyes of its leading artists.

The artists highlighted here include figures of national prominence like Robert Wilson; emerging artists such as Helen Altman and Jesse Amado; and artists who have made a significant impact on the evolution of American art, from the Texas-born Robert Rauschenberg to artists who have worked in Texas for extended periods like Rackstraw Downes and Donald Judd. Exploring and exploding the cliches that have defined the Lone Star state and its art, this is an important contribution both to regional history and contemporary art.

Light Break presents the first survey since 1996 of photographer Roy DeCarava, an essential figure of American art and culture, whose “poetry of vision” re-forms urban life, labor, love, and jazz into the discovery of “an intimate, emotional arc of transformation.”

Though DeCarava often refrained from public discussion of his work, this catalogue provides important background into determining factors of his aesthetic sensibility—his traditional training in painting and printmaking as well as his philosophical undertakings. It brings the viewer to a consideration of contradictory precepts in DeCarava’s work that seeks resolution through tonal and structural elements within the image.

Light Break presents a wide-ranging selection of DeCarava’s photographs accompanied by a preface by Zoé Whitley, an American curator based in London, and features an introduction and essay by curator and art historian Sherry Turner DeCarava. Titled “Celebration,” Turner DeCarava’s essay considers the artist’s singular poetic vision, his timeless portrayals of individuals and places, and his mastery of composition and photographic printmaking.

“In making photographs, as in life, DeCarava was patient. Possessing both a peerless self-awareness and acute observational skills, he knew intuitively when to wait and when to open the camera’s shutter. In the dark room, he availed himself of these same attributes, moving with steady assurance to develop his prints so as to allow the full range of what he called his “infinite scale of grey tones”—often realized at the deepest end of the spectrum—to emerge slowly and fully.”

This exquisite volume showcases a dynamic range of images that underscore DeCarava’s subtle mastery of tonal and spatial elements across a wide, fascinating array of subject matter: from the figural implications of smoke and debris to the “shimmering mirror beneath a mother as she walks with her children in the morning light.” These photographs express a strength of imagery—an intent to synchronize and honor the pulse of art as an emergent signal for creative and revelatory freedom.

Explore Frank Walter’s relationship to Antigua through a range of works and writings that express his intimate connection to Caribbean nature, landscape, and place.

“Nothing seems to be reworked—it is as if each piece drew or painted itself without being adjusted, revised, or fussed over.” —Hyperallergic

Influenced by his studies of agriculture and the sugar industry in the former British colony of Antigua as well as in England, Scotland, and West Germany, Walter created work inspired by his thoughts, knowledge, journeys, and surroundings—work that encompassed painting, drawing, writing, sculpture, photography, and sound. His paintings—tender, quiet, and lush—transcend the traditional tourist’s view of island life in favor of perspectives that explore how and why we look at where we are.

Published on the occasion of the 2022 exhibition at David Zwirner, this catalogue includes an introduction by the show’s curator Hilton Als. Barbara Paca, the leading expert on Walter, writes a text detailing her personal experience meeting Walter and being in his presence. An essay by Charlie Porter takes readers on a walk as he muses about Walter’s life and the nature depicted in his paintings. Joshua Jelly-Schapiro travels to Antigua to explore the history of the island and Walter’s lasting impact there.

Expressive and rich paintings by the Zimbabwean artist Portia Zvavahera—made during a time of intense solitude and collective struggle across the globe

“The rising star’s ethereal work is filled with transcendent imagery that allows the viewer to peek beyond the veil of earthly existence.” — Naomi Rea, Artnet News

In her paintings, Zvavahera gives form to emotions that manifest from other realms and dimensions beyond the domains of everyday life and thought. Her vivid imagery is rooted in the cornerstones of our earthly existence—life and death, pain and pleasure, isolation and connection, and love and loss. This is the first book to explore her work in vivid detail.

Zvavahera draws from a powerful visual vocabulary comprising women, her family, and shape-shifting animals, in scenes both metaphorical and fantastical. In several paintings, she makes use of intricate patterns taken from her own floral or classical Zimbabwean designs. Her particular process of alternating painting and printing results in images that communicate complex emotions in a play of tension and release. The result is a deeply personal body of work that probes the nature of the human condition. As Zvavahera states, “It is me in the paintings.… I can only speak about myself.”

In addition to gorgeous reproductions of seventy-five paintings, including up-close details and installation views, this catalogue also features a new essay by curator Meredith Brown and an interview with the artist by writer Allie Biswas. This catalogue surveys work made since 2017, including her much-lauded contribution to the 2022 Venice Biennale.

With a body of powerful paintings, dynamic installations, and hauntingly poetic video works, Oscar Murillo has distinguished himself as one of his generation’s leading voices. Published on the occasion of Murillo’s 2017 solo exhibition at Haus der Kunst in Munich, this volume––the first dedicated overview of his astonishing career to date––presents the artist’s multifaceted practice from every angle.

Born in Colombia, Murillo became widely recognized in his early twenties for his large-scale paintings that drew freely on both personal as well as art-historical references and influences. Since then, Murillo has been consistently interested in approaches to art making that are not rooted in the dominant Western value system, while remaining guided by his own aesthetic, rather than political messages or other, more reductive narratives. With numerous exhibitions at major museums and galleries, as well as ambitious projects at lesser-known exhibition spaces in Anyang (South Korea), Baku (Azerbaijan), Marrakech (Morocco), and Sharjah (United Arab Emirates), Murillo puts his politics of inclusivity to work without needing to make the work itself overtly political. In positioning himself between worlds—the art world, his family and community, peripheral spaces he seeks to inhabit—Murillo has made room for a new visual language, one that draws as easily and subversively on his personal narratives and the narratives around the places he has visited, as it does on traditional vocabularies of painting, installation, and sculpture.

With an introduction by Okwui Enwezor and new scholarship by Anna Schneider and Emma Enderby, this publication offers critical insight into Murillo’s complex, vibrant body of work that continually offers enriching, powerful observations of the world around us.

Jazz is an essential volume of rare and previously unseen photos by Steve Schapiro, featuring the biggest 1960s jazz legends.

One of the leading social documentary photographers of the 1960s, Steve Schapiro’s images stand among the most important of the 20th century, covering Muhammad Ali, Martin Luther King, Jr., James Baldwin and many others. These largely unknown jazz photos – shot just before his career breakthrough – showcase his early mastery and his empathy for his subjects, making Jazz: Best of the Apollo, Village Vanguard, and Riverside Sessions an essential archive.

In the early ’60s, when Schapiro arrived on the scene, New York jazz was enjoying a golden age. A young freelance photographer who had grown up in the Bronx and somehow snagged a gig with Riverside Records, he began voraciously documenting shows, players, venues, recording sessions and gatherings both in his native New York and later in Chicago. Whether it’s Sonny Rollins lifting weights backstage, or Bobby Timmons lost in an instant of discovery at the piano, Schapiro was on their wavelength.

Written by US jazz journalist Richard Scheinin Jazz: Best of the Apollo, Village Vanguard, and Riverside Sessions features dozens of never-before-seen photos of jazz legends like Cannonball Adderley, Melba Liston, Bill Evans, Wayne Shorter, Freddie Hubbard, Sonny Rollins, Count Basie and more.

Substantial book is a unique exploration of a major collection of art by Black American and African American artists, comprising some 1,000 works by more than 200 individuals.

Over 55 years, a museum in the American South has built one of the nation’s most significant collections of Black American art. This new publication brings together every Black American artist represented in the Birmingham Museum of Art, spanning the early 19th century to the present day. The volume features over 250 artworks across various media—paintings, prints, photographs, sculpture, quilts and mixed-media works—by artists living and working both in Alabama and across the United States.

Artists featured include David Driskell, Jacob Lawrence, Romare Bearden, Robert S. Duncanson, Meta Vaux Warrick Fuller, Sister Gertrude Morgan, Jimmy Lee Sudduth, Mary Frances Whitfield, Trena Banks, Purvis Young, Glenn Ligon, Edmonia Lewis, Lorna Simpson, Chakaia Booker, Sam Gilliam, Kerry James Marshall, Joshua Johnson, Nick Cave, Elizabeth Catlett, Amalia Amaki and Carrie Mae Weems.

Publication accompanies an exhibition marking the Birmingham Museum of Art, AL's 75th Anniversary celebrations.

Residual textures, patterns and structures of the abandoned Ebony and Jet offices represent both the spirit of a Black publishing empire and the sense of its loss

This book by photographer Barbara Karant commemorates the Johnson Publishing Company, publisher of the iconic Ebony and Jet magazines and the most influential Black-owned media corporation of its day. Karant spent more than three years documenting the company’s historic building at 820 S. Michigan Avenue in downtown Chicago, capturing the last vestiges of the original workspace after the company sold the building in 2010 and relocated in 2012. These vibrant interiors, which remained largely unchanged from 1972 to 2012, fostered the creativity of a staff working in a variety of media. Each floor of the 11-story building flaunted distinct color and pattern combinations, and its bold, contemporary design telegraphed JPC’s position at the forefront of Black American business and culture. Stripped of its furnishings, the interiors of the former JPC headquarters simultaneously represent the spirit of this landmark company and the sense of its loss, of a seminal moment in Black American history and the history of this nation.
Accompanying the approximately 125 color photographs by Karant are documentary images of the original interiors, along with other archival material.  A foreword by Deborah Willis and essays by Aaron Bryant, Cheryl Finley, Carla Williams, Jon Ott, Brenna Wynn Greer, and E. James West address JPC’s dominance as an image and tastemaker in mid- to late-20th century America, the landscape of American Black media, the Ebony in-house photo studio, and the site-specific lobby sculpture by Richard Hunt. Short texts by former employees who worked in the building contribute important documentation to JPC’s history. 820 Ebony/Jet is a tribute to the achievements of this remarkable American company.

The first monograph for Leilah Babirye, foregrounding her artistic development, engagement with African sculpture and expansion of queer histories

Published with Institute of Contemporary Art, Boston.

The evocative, adorned sculptures―made from wood and ceramics―of Ugandan artist Leilah Babirye (born 1985) foreground the inventive reuse of debris. She repurposes the metal gears and chains of bicycles to create elaborate headdresses, jewelry and braids, and the rubber inner tubes of bicycle tires to form long tresses.
In this volume, Babirye discusses the origins of her practice and artistic development in conversation with Margaret Nagawa, the artist’s former professor. Curator Natasha Becker analyzes Babirye’s work in the context of African sculptural practices and contemporary art, representing the most significant scholarly engagement with the artist’s work to date. For Babirye, who fled Uganda after being outed as gay, this exhibition and catalog continue her commitment to uplifting LGBTQ+ identities through her unique and striking sculptures.

Freshly expanded and resequenced, McClellan’s beloved photobook chronicling Black American cowboy culture returns to print

Ivan McClellan’s Eight Seconds is the result of more than a decade spent living inside Black cowboy culture. What began as an introduction to the Black rodeo in 2015 has become a sustained artistic collaboration built on trust and curiosity. Moving across the United States with his camera, McClellan makes intimate portraits of a community where individualism, place, style and athleticism converge, and where a new generation is reshaping the image of the American West in real time. The title refers to how bull riding is scored, but here it speaks to an interval in time where life and death are at stake. Like the cowboys he photographs, McClellan works in a space that demands total presence, where the connections to animals and land meet to create moments of universal appeal. These photographs move beyond the rodeo arena to foreground a culture that demands individuality and self-expression. The result is a contemporary language that builds a new myth out of the old West. First published to great acclaim in 2024, the second edition of Eight Seconds is newly sequenced and includes 91 previously unpublished images as well as a new introduction and foreword.
Ivan McClellan (born 1982) is a photojournalist based in Portland, Oregon. His work has been featured in Andscape and Fast Company. As a designer, he has led projects for Nike, Adidas, Disney and the US National Soccer Team.

Toward a new “New World”―the interwoven 18th-century Americas as viewed through fine art, religious items, furniture, decorative objects and more

The story of 18th-century art from the Americas has traditionally emphasized a narrative of exceptionalism and independence. Yet the reality of this history is a far more nuanced story of encounter and interdependence across the geographic regions that are known today as North America, South America, Central America and the Caribbean. Drawing a cultural cartography with objects from the collection of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, Art in the Americas illustrates the exchange of ideas, materials, styles and techniques in the Western hemisphere. Family portraits by John Singleton Copley pair with pastel drawings of Black women in Guadeloupe; delicate blue-and-white Chinese export bowls sit alongside sterling silver Torah finials; an inlaid cabinet made in New Spain dazzles next to an Andean tapestry. Together with dozens of other objects, these works invert the typical dynamics of old world and new world; colonizer and colonized; tradition and innovation. Bolstered with essays by 27 writers, Art in the Americas reflects the range of voices who created fine and decorative arts in the 18th century, and those who study and present their legacy today.

A technique-focused study of Hodges’ recent paintings, where soft brushstrokes against black ground contribute to his subtle approach to the figure in space

Compton-born, Maine-based painter Reggie Burrows Hodges (born 1965) originally studied film and performance art, and thus brings a sense of dramatic staging to his compositions. Beginning with a black ground, Hodges builds his scenes through loose brushwork―a technique which deliberately plays with perceptions by reducing the focus on the human figure. As Hodges says, “I’m painting an environment in which the figures emerge from negative space.” By focusing on the environment where the figures are situated rather than the figures themselves, Hodges explores questions of identity, community and memory. Published on the occasion of the artist’s first solo museum exhibition in Europe, Mela features over 30 new works inspired by his relocation to Malta.

Der US-amerikanische Fotograf Paul Mpagi Sepuya thematisiert in seinen vielschichtig komponierten Porträt- und Studiofotografien queeres Begehren. In intimen Begegnungen mit Freund·innen erkundet er mithilfe von Spiegeln, Stoffen und Requisiten Blickbeziehungen und die ihnen zugrunde liegenden Machtstrukturen. Seine Fotografien ziehen die Betrachter·innen in die kraftvolle Bilddynamik von Sehen und Begehren im Blick der Kamera. Das ausstellungsbegleitende Magazin ist die erste eigenständige Publikation über den Künstler im deutschsprachigen Raum. Paul Mpagi Sepuya, geboren 1982 in San Bernardino, Kalifornien, lebt und arbeitet in Los Angeles, Kalifornien. Doris Gassert ist Medienwissenschaftlerin und Research Curator am Fotomuseum Winterthur. Stefan Gronert ist Kunsthistoriker und Kurator für Fotografie und Medien am Sprengel Museum Hannover. Christopher A. Nixon ist Philosoph, Komparatist und freier Kurator.

Flip through hundreds of record sleeve artworks from Folkways, one of the most iconic independent record labels dedicated to global music

The Folkways Records and Service Corporation was founded in 1948 by Moses Asch, who was encouraged by Albert Einstein to document the “sounds of the world.” Between 1949 and 1987, before its acquisition by Smithsonian, the label released more than 2,000 records of jazz, folk, avant-garde, nature sounds, spoken word poetry, speeches and more. The company stood (and still stands) head and shoulders above all other “world music” record labels in its depth of representation and its understanding of the nature of sound itself.
Much of the success of Folkways’ unique yet cohesive identity is owed to Ronald Clyne, the primary designer at the record label. He gave Folkways record covers both an incredibly stylish look and an underlying seriousness of intent and vision. Dedicated to both Folkways itself and its design achievements, this book features hundreds of visually stunning record sleeve artworks from a plethora of voices and sounds, from albums by Duke Ellington, John Cage and Allen Ginsberg to The Music of Equatorial New Guinea, Sea Shanties and Loggers Songs and The Voices of the Civil Rights Movement.

A resplendent showcase of Simpson’s works from the past decade that foregrounds her celebrated foray into painting

Rising to prominence in the mid-1980s for her innovative approach to conceptual photography, American artist Lorna Simpson (born 1960) has continued to turn a critical gaze on the mechanisms of image composition―particularly within America, where racial and gender biases profoundly shape people’s perceptions of themselves and others. Since the middle of the 2010s, painting has become a particularly fertile field of exploration for the artist, expanding the ways she tackles the great questions that lie at the center of her work: the erosion and rebirth of memory, the pitfalls of representation, the instability of narratives. In her intensely saturated, atmospheric paintings, majestic female figures frequently emerge from the pictorial matter, squarely confronting the viewer’s gaze. This monograph showcases over a decade of Simpson’s innovative painting practice alongside collages, videos, sculptures and installations. It features approximately 50 works, including canvases created for the 56th Venice Biennale, as well as several brand-new pieces.

From theatrical costumes to leather accessories and jewelry, Saar’s early wearable artworks are as transformative as her assemblages

Organized around Betye Saar’s early work in costume and jewelry design during the 1960s and 1970s, Let’s Get It On explores how this formative period profoundly shaped her pioneering work in assemblage and installation. Through original drawings, essays, archival materials and installation images, the book traces Saar’s evolution from designer to artist, revealing the enduring connections between her wearable creations and her broader visual language. It features newly commissioned scholarship alongside rare photographs, sketches, jewelry, garments and ephemera from Saar’s personal archives, offering fresh insight into the artist’s lifelong engagement with materials, memory and Black cultural expression. The book also includes a custom-designed sewing pattern by Betye Saar, inspired by her studio practice. This set features comprehensive instructions, precision-cut pattern pieces and an exclusive artist-designed iron-on: everything you need to spark your own creative journey. Let’s Get It On provides an invaluable resource for understanding the full scope of Saar’s creative practice and her influence across generations.
Betye Saar (born 1926) is renowned for pioneering Black feminism and West Coast assemblage in her visionary artistic practice, through dense, complexly referential objects. For over seven decades, Saar’s work has led dialogues on race and gender, reflecting changing cultural and political contexts. Most recently, solo presentations have been hosted by the Museum of Modern Art, New York, and the Los Angeles County Museum of Art. Saar’s work was prominently featured in We Wanted a Revolution: Black Radical Women, 1965–85 at the Brooklyn Museum and in Soul of a Nation: Art in the Age of Black Power at Tate Modern.

From Ana Mendieta to Stephanie Syjuco, a chain of contemporary artists mounts a cross-cultural, multigenerational resistance to Western colonialism

Published with Colby College Museum of Art.

In the late 19th century, independence movements against Spanish colonization were separately gaining momentum on these islands. Following the Spanish–American war of 1898, the US occupied Cuba and exerted colonial control over Guam, the Philippines and Puerto Rico. Connecting generations across oceans, Imagining an Archipelago features artists such as Pacita Abad, Zilia Sánchez and Carlos Villa juxtaposed with those who came after them, creating an intertwined commentary. The interpretive framework of an archipelago―an expanse of water containing a chain of islands―emphasizes these 40 artists’ different yet related strategies toward the critique, defiance and navigation of conditions brought on by continental empires. Essays, poetry, artworks and artist discussions in English, Spanish, Filipino and CHamoru provide a platform for solidarity, healing and celebration at the intersections of cultural and political self-determination, indigeneity, migration, climate crisis and resilience.
Artists include: Zilia Sánchez, Carlos Villa, Pacita Abad, Ana Mendieta, Daniel Lind-Ramos, Juan Sánchez, Felix Gonzalez-Torres, María Magdalena Campos-Pons, Juana Valdés, Teresita Fernández, Edra Soto, Miguel Luciano, Beatriz Santiago Muñoz, Stephanie Syjuco, Amber Robles-Gordon, Maia Cruz Palileo, Martha Atienza, Mariquita ""Micki"" Davis, Enzo Camacho & Ami Lien, Isa Gagarin, Camille Hoffman, Gisela McDaniel.

Catalogue de l’exposition, Henry Taylor, au Musée national Picasso-Paris, du 8 avril à septembre 2026. L’exposition prévue au Musée national Picasso-Paris sera élaborée en étroite collaboration avec l’artiste, adoptant une approche large et offrant par endroits une perspective rétrospective. Placée sous le commissariat de Joanne Snrech, conservatrice au Musée national Picasso-Paris, cette présentation s’inscrit dans les recherches et l’exploration menées par l’institution autour de l’influence et de la réception de Picasso sur la scène artistique américaine. Elle prolonge ainsi un cycle d’expositions, initié avec Faith Ringgold en 2023, poursuivi avec Jackson Pollock en 2024, puis Philip Guston en 2025. Elle ouvrira également la voie à la grande rétrospective dédiée au mouvement de la Harlem Renaissance, prévue pour le printemps 2027, affirmant la volonté du musée d’élargir et de renouveler la lecture de la scène artistique américaine. Le catalogue de l’exposition sera composé d’un texte de présentation du parcours de l’artiste par la commissaire, Joanne Snrech ; d’un entretien entre Cécile Debray et Henry Taylor autour de son lien à Picasso ; d’un texte d’histoire de l’art sur la représentation de l’histoire des États-Unis dans l’œuvre de l’artiste par Elvan Zabunyan ; d’une reprise d’un texte de Laura Hoptman paru en 2012 pour le MoMA et d’une chronologie de François Dareau.

Immer mehr Künstler·innen aus der Mehrheitswelt jenseits des klassischen „Westens“ verhandeln Fragen nach der eigenen Geschichte und Herkunft anhand von Fotografien aus der Kolonialzeit. In ihren Werken verbinden sie persönliche Erlebnisse mit kollektiven Erfahrungen, verknüpfen Gedächtnisspuren mit künstlerischer Imagination. Durch textile, fotografische, filmische und skulpturale Collagen entstehen neue Erinnerungen, die nicht bei einer historischen Reflexion kolonialistischer Unterdrückung haltmachen, sondern in Bewegung bleiben, sich widersetzen und als lebendiges Fundament für die Zukunft dienen. Der Band Fast ein Paradies, der anlässlich der gleichnamigen Ausstellung im Museum Rietberg erscheint, ist die erste Gesamtschau dieses internationalen Phänomens. Texte zu den beteiligten Künstler·innen werden ergänzt durch kritische Beiträge zur Geschichte der kolonialzeitlichen ­ Fotografie. Kimberly Juanita Brown ist Direktorin des Institute for Black Intellectual and Cultural Life am Dartmouth College. Nanina Guyer ist Kuratorin für Fotografie am Museum Rietberg. Patricia Hayes ist Inhaberin des Lehrstuhls für Visual History & Theory an der University of the Western Cape. Deborah Willis leitet den Fachbereich Photography & Imaging an der New York University. Bindi Vora ist interdisziplinäre Künstlerin und leitende Kuratorin der Galerie Autograph, London.

An overview of Brackens’ magical realist textiles that interfuse mythology with American history and Black identity

This monograph offers an intimate and expansive introduction to the work of American textile artist Diedrick Brackens (born 1989). His practice is shaped through sustained contemplation of American history, autobiography and myth, conjuring imagined spaces where time oscillates between past and future. Drawing from a wide range of textile traditions―West African weaving, quilting from the American South and European tapestry-making―alongside literature and poetry, his figurative and abstract works build a collaged visual language that is both deeply personal and open-ended. Brackens depicts nuanced visions of Black life and identity, while also alluding to the complicated histories of labor and migration through his use of materials: cotton, tea and bleach, to name a few. Through three essays, a poem and an in-depth conversation with the artist, the book foregrounds Brackens’ meticulous process―hand-dyed cotton, deliberate weaving―and considers how his works invite sustained looking, offering textiles as sites of care, ritual and transformation.

“[Pusey] was a builder and a breaker, a composer of surfaces that vibrate. Her abstractions are alive with feeling, frequency, and vision.” ―Chenoa Baker, the Brooklyn Rail

Published with The Studio Museum in Harlem.

Jamaican-born artist Mavis Pusey (1928–2019) developed her clean, graphic style of hard-edge abstraction from her education in fashion design and her time spent working in the fashion industry. Her paintings and prints abound with architectural shapes and patterns. Mobile Images is the first major catalog dedicated to Pusey’s long-overlooked practice. It brings together newly commissioned scholarship by Hallie Ringle, Valerie Cassel Oliver, Cecilia González Godino and Kiki Teshome, each addressing a different aspect of Pusey’s practice―from her transnational biography and commitment to abstraction, to her engagement with architecture, sound and Black feminist artistic lineages. Illustrated with paintings, prints, works on paper, archival materials and installation photography, Mobile Images serves as both an authoritative reference and a visual record of Pusey’s work.

American grit and grift, myths and perversions: examining the long-form creative conversation between Jafa and Prince

Born a decade apart, American artists Arthur Jafa (born 1960) and Richard Prince (born 1949) share an ethos of lawlessness when it comes to the appropriation and manipulation of images siphoned from movies, pulp novels, comic books, YouTube videos, sci-fi stories, album covers, record sleeves, rock ’n’ roll posters, first-edition Beat volumes, news reels, celebrity memorabilia and social media posts. Both artists chart peculiar topographies specific to the United States: Jafa’s reflecting his identity as an African American man coupled with a mission to invigorate Black cinema and art; Prince’s hovering between a self-conscious critique of white masculinity and a fascination with the underbelly of the American psyche. This volume creates a dialogue between the two artists, which unfolds through a series of thematic juxtapositions―combinations of works by both artists that illuminate each of their practices and tease out shared subject matter and mutual obsessions.

Taking inspiration from a song by Marvin Tate, Gates personifies the city of Chicago through a grid of stone sculptures, tar paintings and performance activations

In Oh, You’ve Got to Come Back to the City, Chicago-based artist Theaster Gates (born 1973) brings together a new series of tar paintings, sculptures and installations to tell an allegory of the city in decay and the potential contained within its ruins. The exhibition’s title comes from a song by Chicago musician and poet Marvin Tate, in which the city, personified as a character, has cleaned up its act and attempts to lure its residents back from the suburbs. In this body of work, Gates wrestles with the burden brought on by aging infrastructure to create new narratives that build on the rich metaphors embedded in his materials―as tools of resistance, signs of excess and evidence of decline.

On 8 March 1968, Life magazine published “A Harlem Family” by Gordon Parks, a searing portrait of poverty in the United States, told through images and text about a single family residing in Harlem, the Fontenelles. On the twentieth anniversary of The Gordon Parks Foundation, this new, expanded study considers this story as a pivotal moment in Parks’ life, and one that launched his career in film. Since the publication in 2012 of a book devoted to Parks’ photo essay, additional images belonging to the series have been discovered, and research has been conducted on the accompanying film, Diary of a Harlem Family (1968). The present volume tells the story of Parks’ project through this updated lens. This material is accompanied by previously unpublished texts and ephemera related to the project, including correspondence and other documents Parks amassed over the years while he kept in touch with the Fontenelles, letters written by Life readers showing an outpouring of support for the family, and the transcript of a conversation between Parks and Michael Torosian about the making of the story. Essays by Studio Museum of Harlem director and chief curator Thelma Golden, Oscar-winning author Cord Jefferson, and noted scholars Leigh Raiford and Michael Boyce Gillespie offer enlightening commentary on this seminal body of work. Co-published with The Gordon Parks Foundation

Awarded the Deloitte Photo Grant 2025, this imagined photo archive transmutes grief into a reflection on memory, absence and identity

When the Ghanaian photographer and filmmaker Carlos Idun-Tawiah’s (born 1997) father died, he was left with few photos of him and his father together. Photography was not widely accessible in Ghana during the time of his childhood, so Idun-Tawiah lacked a photo archive through which he could process his grief. He created Hero, Father, Friend in order to fill this disheartening gap. Featuring reconstructed scenes, both real and imagined, from Idun-Tawiah’s memory of his father, the photobook bears testimony to a cherished familial bond. Idun-Tawiah’s photographs depict piano lessons with his grandfather, days on the beach with his uncle and games of soccer with his cousins―a family network united to fill the complex role of paternity. Denis Curti and Alessio Fusi contribute essays that provide a critical counterpoint to Idun-Tawiah’s visual narration by analyzing how its emotional and aesthetic attributes interrelate.

Over 20 years of Pruitt’s expansive vision of Blackness, articulated through large-scale drawings as well as sculptures, graphic novels, photographs, animations and installations

Published with Contemporary Arts Museum Houston.

This publication commemorates the American artist Robert Pruitt (born 1975), who works across drawing, sculpture, photography and animation. Pruitt is famed for rendering large-scale drawings of Black subjects in conté on hand-dyed paper. He places his subjects―who are often modeled after friends and family―within imagined scenarios, narrativized through clothing and accoutrements that reference historical Black struggles as well as hip-hop culture and comic books. In doing so, he advances a diverse and radical vision of Blackness past and present.
This substantial monograph aims to broaden public understanding of Pruitt’s practice by including his lesser-known sculpture, graphic novel and installation works. The most comprehensive volume on Pruitt’s oeuvre to-date, this book delves into the artist’s influences, research, training and legacy through fresh scholarship and an interview.

A sweeping survey of Black quiltmaking in America with stunning archival photographs of quilters and quilting bees, as well as full-page reproductions of both significant historical quilts and bold contemporary creations.

This compelling volume gives Black quilting traditions long-overdue attention, highlighting the artistry, innovation, and community solidarity of quilters from the 1700s through today. The deeply researched text of scholar and artist Dr. Sharbreon Plummer explores quilts as an archive of collective and personal memory, delves into methods of Black quiltmaking―both distinctive and endlessly diverse―and demonstrates the power of quilts and quilting as medicine against grief and oppression.

* This book evokes the craftsmanship and tactile beauty of quilts with stunning archival and full-color photos.
* Discover the stories of scores of individual creators throughout history, including self-taught seamstresses, community organizers, and archivists of everyday life.
* Delve deeper into the stories behind world-renowned artists, past and present, like Bisa Butler, Faith Ringgold, and the Quilters of Gee’s Bend.
* Each profile illuminates the reasons behind the quilts: to honor heritage, express political beliefs, process grief, find peace, or simply create beauty.

Stories in the Seams celebrates the act of sewing in solitude or in community, as resistance or as rest. Whether you’re a veteran quilter, a textile arts appreciator, or a beginner exploring the art form, this is an informative, inspiring, and indispensable resource.

JOIN THE QUILTING MOMENT: Whether you've been wowed by major museum exhibitions of textile arts, just joined a local quilting circle, or are simply a fan of patchwork styles and nostalgic Americana aesthetics, now is the perfect time to enrich your knowledge of quilt history.

UNTOLD HISTORY: This book shares the often-ignored stories of self-taught artists, independent women creators, intergenerational collaborations, and more. From artists who created under enslavement in the early 1800s to sewing cooperatives formed in the 1960s, Dr. Plummer traces the story of quilts through a lens of personal and communal healing.

A VIBRANT AND THRIVING CREATIVE TRADITION: Black quiltmaking isn't limited to one style or frozen in the past. This book highlights the kaleidoscopic variety and continual innovation that define this art form.

Perfect for: 

* Quilters, sewists, and other crafters, makers, and collectors
* Art history buffs and readers of artist biographies
* Anyone interested in Black culture, history, and art
* Professional artists and designers, art students, and researchers
* Creatives interested in the intersection of art and activism

The Sande Society of the Mende people of Sierra Leone is a secret female regulatory society that both guards and transmits the ideals of feminine beauty so fundamental to the aesthetic criteria in Mende culture. In this eloquent and moving book, Sylvia Ardyn Boone describes the Society, its rituals and organization, and the mask worn by its members. Her book is an evocative account of Mende life and philosophy as well as a unique contribution to the study of African art, one based on African conceptions about the person and the human body.
"This is a beautiful and beautifully written book. … Boone writes in ways that reveal her evident devotion to Mende culture."―John Picton, African Affairs
"A major contribution to our ethnographic understanding of Mende culture, and to understanding the way concepts of women’s bodies encode cultural messages about gender relations."―E. Frances White, Women’s Review of Books
"A respectful approach to [the mysteries of the Sande], by an art historian who has tiptoed where anthropologists feared to tread. Radiance from the Waters deserves to be read. … It provides something more interesting than esoteric knowledge: an extended meditation on notions of beauty and decorum and the way in which these can be translated simultaneously into art and … advancement for women."―John Ryle, London Review of Books
"The first text to illuminate the power of the feminine aesthetic in West African art."―Ms.

In Art as Sanctuary, Michael D. Harris considers literal and metaphorical uses of sanctuary in the black experience and African diaspora art, including locales of spiritual expression, self-renewal, and cultural celebration. Harris offers an alternative framework to the Duboisian philosophy of double consciousness, pushing the boundaries of Africana aesthetic analysis by exploring the cultural signifiers embedded consciously or unconsciously in African diaspora art. Within these works, he reveals how these cultural cues speak to the vibrancy of African American life. While acknowledging the presence of the white observer’s gaze, Harris wishes to relieve the black interior from the panoptic assumptions of that gaze and its disciplines. Art as Sanctuary provides innovative pathways to understand African American visual culture and music as autobiographies of cultural identity and experience.

Moving Stones explores the extraordinary life and work of Edmonia Lewis, the Black and Ojibwe sculptor who rose to international fame in the nineteenth century. Blending biography, history, and theory, Jennifer DeVere Brody approaches Lewis’s legacy through a Black feminist and queer lens, illuminating how her sculptures and self-fashioning challenged constraints of her time. Living much of her life in Rome as a free Afro-Native woman, Lewis used neoclassical forms to carve out a life in art. Brody considers how Lewis’s works were viewed historically and how they resonate with postmodern artists, engaging themes of race, materiality, sexuality, and embodiment. Rethinking one of the most important sculptors of her era, Moving Stones shows how Lewis’s art continues to inspire contemporary artists and scholars today.