Book Talk by Richard J. Powell: Colorstruck! Painting, Pigment, Affect

Art historian Richard J. Powell examines how Black American painters have used color to shape meaning, memory and emotional response in a talk at ICA Miami. The Saturday, October 3 program draws from his new book, Colorstruck! Painting, Pigment, Affect, and concludes with an audience Q&A.

Powell traces the cultural and historical significance of color in works by artists including Jacob Lawrence, Alma Thomas, Sam Gilliam, Jean-Michel Basquiat, Lynette Yiadom-Boakye and Henry Taylor. Taking its title from the 20th-century term “colorstruck,” the book considers how pigment and palette intersect with race, identity, freedom and reclamation in Black American art.

Powell is the John Spencer Bassett Distinguished Professor of Art and Art History at Duke University and the author of books including Going There: Black Visual Satire, Cutting a Figure: Fashioning Black Portraiture and Homecoming: The Art and Life of William H. Johnson. The presentation takes place in the ICA Miami Garden.