The exhibition Humanity Today highlights current tensions surrounding civil rights around the world that are reminiscent of past conditions such as Anti-Apartheid, the U.S. Civil Rights movement and the U.S.’s isolation of Cuba. The exhibition presents a perspective on these pivotal periods in history, featuring works by Sadie Barnette, Victor Ehikhamenor, Aida Muluneh, Carlos Javier Ortiz, Blessing Ngobeni, Gordon Parks, and Lissette Solórzano. The artists of Humanity Today focus on moving towards equality for all. Blessing Ngobeni, fueled by the social injustices of post-apartheid South Africa and the unkept promises of Nelson Mandela, creates paintings that condemn the country’s elite and attack the established power structure. As the world reacts to President Trump, the racial and social tensions of today are reflected in the work of Gordon Parks’ civil rights photographs of the 50’s and 60’s. The current fights in America for reproductive rights, open immigration, and LGBT equality echo the activism portrayed in Parks’ 1963 images of The March on Washington. Carlos Javier Ortiz outlines racial tensions in Chicago and throughout the U.S. focusing on urban life, gun violence, race, and poverty in marginalized communities. Sadie Barnette’s work draws on a 500-page FBI surveillance file on her father, Rodney Barnette, who was a founder of the Compton chapter of The Black Panther Party. Today’s images of refuge migration are mirrored in Lissette Solórzano’s portrayal of Cuban movement within their country after the U.S. isolation of Cuba and during the Special Period (the 1990’s Soviet Union departure from Cuba). The exhibition is on view from February 2 – March 11, 2017.
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