First published April 28, 2022 in Stories Beneath the Shell.
by Kirstin Nichols
Deep in the heart of the Cole Student Activities Building is a space dedicated to highlighting Black and African Diaspora art, the David C. Driskell Center.
“What the Driskell Center does is allows an individual to walk in regardless of their background and see America in a different kind of way, perhaps in a fuller kind of way,” said Driskell Center director Curlee Holton. “You cannot see America unless you see America through the eyes of diverse groups.”
This month until May, the Center is hosting “Telling our Story: Works from the Permanent Collection,” the first in a series of shows that will spotlight the history and the Driskell Center made to the American art canon, according to its website.
The show, curated by collections manager Tamara Schlossenberg and Holton, incorporates selections from the previous show and additional works from the permanent collection that haven’t been publicly displayed yet, according to the Center’s website.
From the outside, the Driskell Center looks small and ordinary. But upon entering, one notices a spacious art gallery room with walls covered in colorful artwork and 3D art in glass boxes. Its archive includes a huge collection of Black art, allowing visitors to research seminal figures in Black art like Faith Ringgold and Tritobia Hayes Benjamin.
The center received its archive from David Driskell, who it’s named after. He was one of the world’s leading authorities on African American art and an artist himself, focusing on portraying America through the eyes of Black Americans, Holton said.
He “approached his career and his practice as an artist and as a scholar celebrating African American contribution, not apologizing for it. No shame, no embarrassment, no apology,” Holton said.
Driskell’s archive includes letters and photographs to document African American art history, as well as his own drawings, doodles and sketches, but was careful to make sure the archive wasn’t entirely about him, center archivist David Conway said. That archive attracted Emory University’s attention and that of other large institutions. They were willing to pay a lot of money for it, Holton said, but Driskell decided that UMD was the best home for it since the university was home to him as an academic and a scholar.
Holton began working with Driskell in 2003, and worked with him for almost two decades as his master printmaker and as a fellow artist. Holton began working at the Driskell Center in 2012, first as a board member and part of the search committee for a new director and once the search was unsuccessful, as temporary director. That “temporary” position turned into a job that continues today.
The center’s founders thought that it would be inspiring to name the center after Driskell since he had a distinguished career as an expert on African American art and culture and was an accomplished educator, artist and curator. They also hoped that the center’s creation would postpone Driskell’s retirement from his long career as an academic at several institutions.
“His style was constantly evolving and changing as he grew as an artist and as he interacted with different artists,” Schlossenberg said.
The center has “a real focus on not only the visual arts, but also on scholarship and research, and Driskell wanted it to be a home for artists, a home for scholars, and to enhance and expand appreciation of African American art,” Holton said.
As part of that mission, the 21-year-old center has a very tight relationship with the surrounding community.
“We’re one of the few institutions… where the community feels they have access to us,” Holton said. “Here, we are approachable, and I think we in many ways have defined ourselves that way.”
Holton said that anyone can reach out to the center and talk to the director, collections manager, or archivist directly, developing personal relationships. That approachability reflects Driskell’s legacy as well, he said. Driskell, who died in 2020, isn’t remembered just for his scholarly and artistic achievements, but also for his humanity, accessibility, and generosity.
“We are all better for it. The University of Maryland is better for it,” Holton said.
Copyright statement for “Heir to the Land”:
Jamaal Barber
Heir to the Land, 2017
Woodcut on fabric
95″ x 40″
David C. Driskell Center at the University of Maryland, College Park.
Purchase with funds from the Thompson Award for Artistic Excellence in the Visual Arts Fund, 2017.07.001.
Copyrights: © Jamaal Barber, 2017
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