Schoener, Allon [Editor]; Hoving, Thomas F. [Preface]; Van Ellison, Candice [Introduction]

HARLEM ON MY MIND: CULTURAL CAPITAL OF BLACK AMERICA 1900-1968 [Signed]

New York, New York: Random House, 1968. First Bookstore Edition, First Printing. Quarto, 255 pages. In Very Good minus condition with Very Good minus condition dust jacket. Spine is white with red, yellow, and black lettering. Dust jacket protected by mylar covering, price cut, and has mild general soiling and shelving wear along extremities. Boards have mild general shelving wear along extremities. Text block moderately age toned, publisher's glue visible along tail edge of rear pastedown. Signed flat by 1966-1977 director of the Metropolitan Museum, Thomas Hoving, on title page. Contains insert from publisher regarding the decision to include Candice Van Ellison's controversial introduction between the rear cover of DJ and mylar covering. Contains pages from April 21, 1968 THE SUNDAY MAGAZINE of Bruce Davidson's photographs of Harlem and accompanying text between front endpapers.

1395659

Special Collections

Price: $200

NOTES

Controversy shrouded The Metropolitan Museum of Art's "Harlem on my Mind" long before its doors opened in 1969. The exhibition, which then-director Thomas Hoving asked Allon Schoener to guest curate as part of the museum's suite of centennial exhibitions, was nascent when Black artists began to withdraw support. They cited the lack of inclusion of Black artists working in and transforming the Harlem art scene, some of whom were already part of The MET's collection, such as the painter Jacob Lawrence. Inclusion was not in the vocabulary of the exhibition, which consisted of photographs featuring (yet clearly decentering) unnamed Harlem residents pictured next to prominent figures. The introduction chosen by Schoener for the catalog, an essay written by 17 year old Harlem resident Candice Van Ellison, contained anti-semitic and anti-Irish slurs which further offended Harlem residents in the wake of racial battles over the school district. In response to the exhibition, Black New York artists formed the Black Emergency Cultural Coalition to protest the exhibition for the entirety of its 16-week run. These protests responded to the exhibition with the question "Harlem on Whose Mind?", calling out white supremacy in the museum setting. Hoving agreed to pull the catalogue from publication and include inserts addressing the controversy in all existing copies. The BECC acted as a catalyst for major change in the ways that museums exhibit Black art, the reverberations of which are felt in the art world today as diverse artists continue the struggle to tell their own narratives.