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Alvia J. Wardlaw (born November 5, 1947) is an American art scholar, and one of the country's top experts on African-American art.[1] She is Curator and Director of the University Museum at Texas Southern University, an institution central to the development of art by African Americans in Houston. She also is a professor of Art History at Texas Southern University. Wardlaw is a member of the Scholarly Advisory Council of the National Museum of African American History and Culture, and co-founded the National Alliance of African and African American Art Support groups in 1998.[2] Wardlaw was University of Texas at Austin's first African-American PhD in Art History.[3]
Alvia Wardlaw | |
|---|---|
| Born | November 5, 1947 |
| Nationality | American |
| Alma mater | Wellesley College NYU University of Texas Austin |
| Occupation | Professor |
From 1995 to 2009, Wardlaw was Curator of Modern and Contemporary Art at the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, where she organized more than 75 exhibitions on African and African-American art.[4] She was adjunct curator of African-American Art at the Dallas Museum of Art in 1994. Her exhibition The Quilts of Gee's Bend, a collection of quilts by outstanding quilters from Alabama, broke attendance records at major museums across the 11 cities to which it traveled[2] and was one of the most talked-about museum shows of 2002 in America and beyond. She has presented exhibitions that added to the American art canon the work of major, previously undercelebrated African-American artists, in particular John Biggers, Thornton Dial and Kermit Oliver.[5] Her own photographs were also shown across Texas. She grew up and lives in Third Ward, Houston, Texas.
Wardlaw received a B.A. degree in Art History from Wellesley College in 1969.[6] In 1986, she earned an M.A. degree in Art History from the New York University Institute of Fine Arts.[6] In 1996, she received a Ph.D. degree in Art History from the University of Texas at Austin.[6]
- 2006: Thorton Dial in the 21st Century; Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, exhibit and catalogue[7]
- 2002–2006: The Quilts of Gees Bend – 11 cities
- Our New Day Begun: African American Artists Entering the Millennium, exhibition catalogue, LBJ Library and Museum
- Roy DeCarava: Photographs, exhibition and exhibition catalogue, The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston
- Ceremonies and Visions: The Art of John Biggers
- Homecoming. African American Family History in Georgia
- John Biggers: Bridges
- 1995: John Biggers: View from the Upper Room, Museum of Fine Arts, Houston
- 2005: Notes from a Child's Odyssey: The Art of Kermit Oliver, Museum of Fine Arts Houston
- 2008: Houston Collects: African American Art, Museum of Fine Arts, Houston
Wardlaw has historicized John Biggers' art philosophy, based in large part on his travels to Africa and his celebration of the African-American community, his legacy and impact on student artists who studied with him, and his impact upon the modern art world.[8] She has mentored countless students of color to pursue careers in the museum field, ranging from curatorial to conservation positions.
- Dominique de Menil asked her to write an essay for the groundbreaking exhibition The De Luxe Show, August 22, 1971, pairing the works of notable white and black artists.
- The exhibition Handcrafted, an early show at the Studio Museum [in Harlem, 1972].
- The Art of John Biggers: View from the Upper Room (with essays by Edmund Barry Gaither, Alison de Lima Greene, and Robert Farris Thompson), Museum of Fine Arts (Houston, TX), 1995.
- (Editor) Grant Hill, Something All Our Own: The Grant Hill Collection of African American Art, Duke University Press (Durham, NC), 2004.
- Notes from a Child's Odyssey: The Art of Kermit Oliver, Museum of Fine Arts (Houston, TX), 2005.
- Charles Alston, Pomegranate (Petaluma, CA), 2007.
- Also author of Black Art, Ancestral Legacy: The African Impulse in African-American Art, as an accompaniment to the exhibition. Contributor of articles and poetry to various publications, including The Black Scholar.[9]
- Collecting African American Art: the Museum of Fine Arts Houston, 2009.[10]
- Fulbright Fellowship in West Africa, Liberia, Sierra Leone and Senegal in 1984
- Fulbright Award for study in Tanzania, East Africa in 1997[11]
- Senior Fellow for the 2001 American Leadership Forum
- Texas Women's Hall of Fame in 1994
- Award of Merit from the University of Texas at Austin
- Ethos Founders Award from Wellesley College
- African American Living Legend by African-American News and Issues
- Texas Southern University's Research Scholar of the Year in 2009.
- In addition, Black Art Ancestral Legacy was named Best Exhibition of 1990 by D Magazine, and The Quilts of Gee's Bend received the International Association of Art Critics Award in 2003.
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