Academic Rants

  The Montclair State University Galleries will present New York-based artist and filmmaker Ajamu Kojo’s   Black Wall Street: A Case for Reparations   from February 15 – April 23, 2022. The artist’s first solo museum exhibition is a sanctuary and homage to Black Americans as Kojo reimagines their past. Black Wall Street: A Case for Reparations  is Kojo’s ongoing series of large-scale paintings that capture the imagined lives of Black professionals in the Greenwood District before the 1921 Tulsa Race Massacre. The community was dubbed “Black Wall Street” for its thriving culture and wealth in spite of strong segregation laws. The portraits present a spiritually uplifting dedication to the people who called Greenwood their home over a century ago. ABOUT THE ARTIST Ajamu Kojo is a figurative painter and filmmaker based in Brooklyn. As a scenic artist, his projects include Law & Order, Boardwalk Empire, Vinyl, BULL and more. Alongside working on television ...

  Celebrating Black History Month 2022 John Andrew Kenney, 1874-1950 The Great Migration, the historic movement of African Americans from the South to the North was triggered by economic opportunities, racial discrimination, racial intimidation and fear. Thousands fled from the former plantations and labor camps to northern cities from Chicago to Washington, D.C. This mass exodus continued for over two decades halted by the impact of the First World War, a series of race riots, a pandemic and ultimately a Great Depression. In the process the nation witnessed a tremendous shift of manpower and brainpower culminating in a Black Renaissance.  Lost in the numbers of southern refugees is John Andrew Kenney, Sr. An unsung hero, Kenney was a noted civil rights activist of the pre-Brown era; a superb physician; member, secretary and later president of the National Medical Association; the founder of the National Medical Association Journal; founder of several hospitals; and devoted hu...