Through paintings, sculptures, drawings and more, John Wilson's work foregrounds the human experience and refuses invisibility

American artist John Wilson was not only a master draftsman, printmaker, painter and sculptor active for over seven decades, but he was also a keen observer and social activist. In his representations of Black Americans in particular, he sought to pay homage to the beauty and truths of ordinary Black people in such a way that all viewers, across race and culture, might see themselves reflected. His multidisciplinary works include unflinching representations of racial violence and war, tender family portraits, monumental bronze heads and landmark commissions such as the bust of Martin Luther King, Jr., which stands in the United States Capitol.
The first major retrospective of the artist’s work, Witnessing Humanity sheds light on Wilson’s life and artistic evolution. Reproductions of artworks and photographs accompany critical essays and personal reflections, including analyses by art historians, interviews with Wilson’s peers, remembrances from fellow Black creatives and a full chronology by the late artist’s gallerist. The varied voices which resonate through this catalog illustrate that it is long past time to recognize Wilson’s art―to celebrate his lifelong dedication to depicting what he described as the "reality of being Black in this impossible world."
John Woodrow Wilson (1922–2015) was born in Roxbury, Massachusetts, and studied at the School of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, and Tufts University. He lived in Mexico for five years and became a friend and colleague of artist Elizabeth Catlett. Wilson taught fine art at Boston University from 1964 until 1986.

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After the Rain is a graphic novel adaptation of Nnedi Okorafor’s short story “On the Road.” The drama takes place in a small Nigerian town during a violent and unexpected storm. A Nigerian-American woman named Chioma answers a knock at her door and is horrified to see a boy with a severe head wound standing at her doorstep. He reaches for her, and his touch burns like fire. Something is very wrong. Haunted and hunted, Chioma must embrace her heritage in order to survive.

John Jennings and David Brame’s graphic novel collaboration uses bold art and colors to powerfully tell this tale of identity and destiny.

Rediscover the sensational 1967 literary thriller that captures the bitter struggles of postwar Black intellectuals and artists

With a foreword by Ishmael Reed and a new introduction by Merve Emre about how this explosive novel laid bare America's racial fault lines

Max Reddick, a novelist, journalist, and presidential speechwriter, has spent his career struggling against the riptide of race in America. Now terminally ill, he has nothing left to lose. An expat for many years, Max returns to Europe one last time to settle an old debt with his estranged Dutch wife, Margrit, and to attend the Paris funeral of his friend, rival, and mentor Harry Ames, a character loosely modelled on Richard Wright.

In Amsterdam, among Harry’s papers, Max uncovers explosive secret government documents outlining “King Alfred,” a plan to be implemented in the event of widespread racial unrest and aiming “to terminate, once and for all, the Minority threat to the whole of the American society.” Realizing that Harry has been assassinated, Max must risk everything to get the documents to the one man who can help.

Greeted as a masterpiece when it was published in 1967, The Man Who Cried I Am stakes out a range of experience rarely seen in American fiction: from the life of a Black GI to the ferment of postcolonial Africa to an insider’s view of Washington politics in the era of segregation and the Civil Rights Movement, including fictionalized portraits of Martin Luther King, Jr., and Malcolm X. John A. Williams and his lost classic are overdue for rediscovery.

Few novels have so deliberately blurred the boundaries between fiction and reality as The Man Who Cried I Am (1967), and many of its early readers assumed the King Alfred plan was real. In her introduction, Merve Emre examines the gonzo marketing plan behind the novel that fueled this confusion and prompted an FBI investigation. This deluxe paperback also includes a new foreword by novelist Ishmael Reed.

CSK Steptoe winner Craig Kofi Farmer's middle grade horror novel follows a boy stuck at a Louisiana plantation during a field trip, only to discover the sinister secrets lurking within ― perfect for fans of THE MIDNIGHT CHILDREN and SMALL SPACES.

Winston has lived most of his life in silence―he has a stutter, and after one too many embarrassing moments at school, he's decided it's safer to keep quiet.

One day, his eighth grade class takes sets off for a field trip, only to become stranded at an old southern plantation when a strange storm hits. There, Winston comes face to face with something terrifying within its walls. It's another Black boy, except this one moves through the world as a spirit. He is an abiku―a child wronged centuries ago by the owners of the house.

As Winston and the Abiku forge an unlikely alliance, the dark history of the plantation unravels― to save his classmates, and the abiku, from an eternity of being trapped in the past, Winston will be forced to face his deepest insecurity head on. Will he find the courage to speak up, and make sure history is not forgotten?

Coretta Scott King John Steptoe award winner Craig Kofi Farmer's latest middle grade novel is a thought-provoking and page-turning tale of a lost boy, a wayward ghost, and the grim legacy of possession in America.

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.

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Ages 13-16

Congressman John Lewis, an American icon and one of the key figures of the civil rights movement, continues his award-winning graphic novel trilogy with co-writer Andrew Aydin and artist Nate Powell, inspired by a 1950s comic book that helped prepare his own generation to join the struggle. Now, March brings the lessons of history to vivid life for a new generation, urgently relevant for today’s world. After the success of the Nashville sit-in campaign, John Lewis is more committed than ever to changing the world through nonviolence - but as he and his fellow Freedom Riders board a bus into the vicious heart of the deep south, they will be tested like never before. Faced with beatings, police brutality, imprisonment, arson, and even murder, the movement’s young activists place their lives on the line while internal conflicts threaten to tear them apart.

But their courage will attract the notice of powerful allies, from Martin Luther King, Jr. to Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy…and once Lewis is elected chairman of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, this 23-year-old will be thrust into the national spotlight, becoming one of the “Big Six” leaders of the civil rights movement and a central figure in the landmark 1963 March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom.

This beautifully illustrated board book highlights true stories of black men in history. The exceptional men featured include artist Aaron Douglas, civil rights leader John Lewis, dancer Alvin Ailey, lawman Bass Reeves, tennis champion Arthur Ashe, and writer James Baldwin.

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Ages 13-16

March is a vivid first-hand account of John Lewis’ lifelong struggle for civil and human rights, meditating in the modern age on the distance traveled since the days of Jim Crow and segregation. Rooted in Lewis’ personal story, it also reflects on the highs and lows of the broader civil rights movement.

Book One spans John Lewis’ youth in rural Alabama, his life-changing meeting with Martin Luther King, Jr., the birth of the Nashville Student Movement, and their battle to tear down segregation through nonviolent lunch counter sit-ins, building to a stunning climax on the steps of City Hall.

Timely, relevant, and illuminating, this essential book by respected cultural historian, teacher, and author John G. Jackson sheds long overdue light on standard Eurocentric and distorting approaches to the history of Africa from early African civilizations to Africa’s significance in world history.
 
With brilliantly objective scholarship, respected historian and author John G. Jackson reexamines the outdated, racist, and Westernized history of Africa that is still taught in schools, and presents one infinitely more rich, colorful, varied—and truthful. Challenging the standard dehumanizing and exploitive approaches to African history, from the dawn of prehistory to the resurgent Africa of today--including the portrayal of Africans as “savages” who ultimately benefitted from European enslavement with its “blessings of Christian civilization”—Jackson confronts the parochial historian, devastates the theoretical pretensions of white supremacists, and expands intellectual horizons.
 
Accessible and informed, fascinating and candid, Introduction to African Civilizations is an important historical guide that will enhance antiracist teachings for the general reader and the scholar alike.
 
Introduction by John Henrik Clarke, pioneer of African Studies and author of Christopher Columbus and the African Holocaust
 
Foreword by Runoko Rashidi, historian, activist, and author of Introduction to the Study of African Classical Civilizations

In The Militant South, 1800-1861, John Hope Franklin identifies the factors and causes of the South's festering propensity for aggression that contributed to the outbreak of the Civil War in 1861.
 
Franklin asserts that the South was dominated by militant white men who resorted to violence in the face of social, personal, or political conflict. Fueled by their defense of slavery and a persistent desire to keep the North out of their affairs, Southerners adopted a vicious bellicosity that intensified as war drew nearer.
 
Drawing from Southern newspapers, government archives, memoirs, letters, and firsthand accounts, Franklin masterfully details the sources and consequences of antebellum aggression in the South.  First published in 1956, this classic volume is an enduring and impeccably researched contribution to Southern history. This paperback edition features a new preface in which the author discusses controversial responses to the book.

A small-town woman’s journey of self-discovery takes an unexpected detour when she inherits a Brooklyn brownstone—complete with one hot next-door neighbor—in this sexy, emotional contemporary romance.

When you least expect it, love comes knocking…

Holland Davenport is ready to go beyond her small-town existence. Her plan involves moving into an apartment in Charleston—not inheriting a run-down brownstone in Brooklyn from a relative she never knew. Yet in a burst of daring, Holland meets the challenge head-on, moving to New York to learn more about her family and renovate the place. Add to that a gorgeous next-door neighbor who turns out to be a board member at her new job, and she’s definitely out of her depth.

Noble Washington is the successful CEO of a company he spent a decade building. But his carefully ordered life begins to unravel the second he meets fiery social worker Holland—and spends one unforgettable night with a woman who should be off-limits.

There’s a wall and a world of differences lying between them. But the sheltered Southerner and the ambitious native New Yorker feel a pull that just won’t be denied…

From showing up to glowing up, the characters in Afterglow Books are on the path to leading their best lives and finding sizzling romance along the way. Don’t miss any of these other fun titles…

Frenemy Fix-Up by Yahrah St. John

Church Girl by Naima Simone

Out of Office by A.H. Cunningham