STATE COLLEGE, Pa. — The Woskob Family Gallery will host an opening reception for "Race and Revolution: Still Separate, Still Unequal" from 5-7 p.m. on Jan. 29.
Curated by Katie Fuller and Larry Ossei-Mensah, "Race and Revolution: Still Separate, Still Unequal" is a traveling exhibition of contemporary artwork and historical documents exploring the ongoing issue of school segregation in the United States, even after the milestone court case in 1954 that ruled segregation unconstitutional exhibition of contemporary inspired by the existence of school segregation in the United States. Originating in Brooklyn, New York, before traveling to universities and cultural institutions across the United States, "Race and Revolution" presents artistic responses to questions of segregation in a variety of media, including sculpture, installation, textiles, works on paper, and photography. The exhibit runs Jan. 29 through April 6.
Several of the artists in the exhibition — some of whom are school teachers themselves — integrate artwork with historical documents, critically examining how local, state and federal governments have maintained or worked to dissolve segregation. Many of the works on view explore how minoritized populations experience things such as standardized testing, resource scarcity, and over-policing. The artwork and historical documents act in a dialogue, exploring how issues of the past resonate in the present.
Co-curator Katie Fuller was an educator for 11 years. As a high school English teacher, she taught literature through the lens of historical events. While working in Museum Education at the New-York Historical Society, she wrote curriculum and taught classes to empower young people on their civil liberties. Always passionate about social justice, she said she felt an urgency to examine historical memory around racism in the United States. Ultimately she left teaching to curate exhibitions examining the often-unspoken histories of racism.
Larry Ossei-Mensah is a Ghanaian-American curator and cultural critic who uses contemporary art and culture as a vehicle to redefine how we see ourselves and the world around us. He has organized exhibitions and projects with artists at commercial and nonprofit spaces around the globe. In 2017, Ossei-Mensah was Critic-in Residence at ART OMI. He currently serves as the Susanne Feld Hilberry Senior Curator at MOCAD in Detroit, and also is a co-founder of the 501(c)(3) ARTNOIR, in addition to being a mentor in the New Museum’s incubator program, NEW INC.
Woskob Family Gallery, located on Allen Street in downtown State College, is a space for contemporary arts and culture. Ann Tarantino, assistant professor in the Penn State School of Visual Arts, has been gallery curator and director since 2015. During that time, the gallery has transformed into a place where viewers of all ages can find something that speaks to them.
For more information, call (814) 865-4710 or email txb725@psu.edu.