This is my first post and I’m very excited to be starting it off with a very fascinating video via TED, featuring the Director of the Studio Museum Harlem, Thelma Golden. I visited the studio two years ago and I fell in love with it. As a student of art, I’ve studied Thelma Golden for quite some time. I dig her concept of a studio setting (that encompases whatever comes to the mind) with a museum flair (housing great works of art) that she has created with vigor!

Personally, I’m in awe with African American – African Art and want to learn more about artists from this background from a global perspective. I know that is because I’m Black too. I believe that as a future Art Librarian that when looking back, I never saw Black art in elementary school, nor was it talked about. I find it to be disheartening and then on the other hand — I’ve finally arrived.

What I appreciate about this video is Thelma Golden’s honest perspective as to why she focuses on African American Art and why she chose to study art through her own personal experiences. The answers that she gives are very real, and I for one believe that cultural identity plays a major part in understanding art and culture.

I thought it was nice that she Golden provided a pictorial documentary of her own experiences with art via the video. I also find it gratifying and encouraging to know that this medium: African American Art  is important to expose within the art world in more ways than one versus the traditional forms of art.  The Director of Studio Museum Harlem confirmed my thoughts and went on to talk about defining art as it relates to Black artists in the 21st century.

Taking notes while watching Thelma Golden, I found pleasure and hope regarding a  question she posed: What is my narrative? How will my narrative help shape the world? I’m right on time with where I want to take my career as an Art Librarian: Black. It does matter, the cultural component that exists within my own soul. I will be looking deeper into these questions as it pertains to art in general and writing about it from a cultural perspective.

Thelma Golden: How art gives shape to cultural change

Via TED: Thelma Golden, curator at the Studio Museum in Harlem, talks through three recent shows that explore how art examines and redefines culture.

The “post-black” artists she works with are using their art to provoke a new dialogue about race and culture — and about the meaning of art itself.