Birmingham Museum of Art<\/a> (BMA) announced today it will display its Black American art collection, one of the most significant collections in the U.S, this September.<\/p>\nThe landmark exhibition is called\u201cRoll Call: Two Hundred Years of Black American Art,\u201d and it\u00a0features 99 works that trace two centuries of Black artistic production, placing questions of presence, authorship and institutional history in direct dialogue.<\/p>\n
Since 1971, BMA has collected more than 1,000 works by 250 Black artists.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cRoll Call reflects both the artistic brilliance of Black artists and the ways a museum collection evolves through intentional choices and community engagement. The exhibition highlights moments when artists, curators, and advocates came together to expand the stories our collection tells.\u201d<\/p>\n
Jade Powers, Hugh Kaul Curator of Contemporary Art<\/p>\n
BMA Black American Art installed in four sections<\/p>\n
![\"AFI.10.2009](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/AFI.10.2009_01_o2.jpg\" "\\"Birmingham")
Robert S. Duncanson (1821\u20131872), A Dream of Italy, 1865, oil on canvas, 20 5\/8 \u00d7 35 in. (52.4 \u00d7 88.9 cm); Collection of the Art Fund, Inc. at the Birmingham Museum of Art, AFI.10.2009<\/p>\n
The installation will be organized in four thematic sections, according to the BMA:<\/p>\n
The Ground We Stand On: Centers foundational moments in the museum\u2019s history, including early and consequential acquisitions of work by Black artists<\/p>\n
Ujima: Collective Work and Responsibility: Foregrounds the role of community advocacy in shaping the collection<\/p>\n
What Freedom Feels Like: Artists explore lived experience through a range of visual languages, from figuration to abstraction, offering reflections on daily life, self-expression and political consciousness\u00a0<\/p>\n
In the Heart of It All: Considers the significance of place, with works inspired by Alabama and Birmingham that connect local histories to broader cultural and national contexts<\/p>\n
![\"1989.63](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/1989.63_01a_p01_o2.jpg\" "\\"Birmingham")
Yvonne Wells (born 1939), Proverbs Quilt, 1988, cotton, polyester, and mixed-blend plain and printed fabrics with buttons and rickrack trim, 75 \u00d7 64 in. (190.5 \u00d7 162.6 cm); Collection of the Birmingham Museum of Art; Museum purchase, 1989.63, \u00a9 Yvonne Wells. Courtesy of the artist and Fort Gansevoort, New York<\/p>\n
The upcoming show, which draws entirely from BMA\u2019s permanent collection, falls on the 75th anniversary of the museum.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe exhibition reflects the cumulative impact of artists, curators and community members whose decisions and advocacy have expanded what is represented here. It is, in many ways, a measure of how far the museum has come and a reminder that this work is ongoing.\u201d<\/p>\n
Graham C. Boettcher, R. Hugh Daniel Director of the Birmingham Museum of Art.<\/p>\n
\u201cRoll Call: Two Hundred Years of Black American Art\u201d will run from September 26, 2026 to January 17, 2027.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Joe Minter (born 1943), \u201963 Foot Soldiers, 1999, found objects, including old Alabama license plates, shoes and boots,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":406050,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[31],"tags":[442,498,499,500,501,156,111,139,69],"class_list":["post-406049","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-arts-and-design","tag-arts","tag-arts-and-design","tag-artsanddesign","tag-artsdesign","tag-design","tag-entertainment","tag-new-zealand","tag-newzealand","tag-nz"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/406049","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=406049"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/406049\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/406050"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=406049"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=406049"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=406049"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
![\"2019.1](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/2019.1_01_d_o2-e1777586130297-1200x628.jpg\" "\\"Birmingham")
Joe Minter (born 1943), \u201963 Foot Soldiers, 1999, found objects, including old Alabama license plates, shoes and boots, toys such as plastic dogs and guns, chains, clothing, an American flag, a metal grate and miscellaneous metal parts, paint, plastic hats, and tires, 49 1\/2 \u00d7 82 \u00d7 32 in. (125.7 \u00d7 208.3 \u00d7 81.3 cm); Collection of the Birmingham Museum of Art; Museum purchase with funds provided by James and Elizabeth Outland, 2019.1, \u00a9 2026 Joe Minter \/ Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York<\/p>\n