Opelousas Museum exhibition features 4 African-American artists
The Opelousas Museum and Interpretive Center will feature works of art by four African-American artists for Black History Month. The exhibition opens with a reception from 5:30 p.m. to 7:30 p.m. Thursday, Feb. 2, and will run through March 31. Featured artists will be Ella Guillory, Randell Henry, Ronald Kennedy and Darlene A. Moore.
Guillory is the first African-American woman to receive a copyright for her Mardi Gras Beads Collection. Living in St. Landry Parish, she became fascinated with beads and found a way to create her own unique designs by incorporating ordinary objects into her works.
Henry, professor of art at Southern University, was recognized in November 2009 by Peter Falk, one of the country’s leading experts on American art, after Falk discovered his collages at an art dealer in Connecticut and acquired 12 of the works. Falk showed the collages in an exhibition at Summer House Fine Art Gallery in downtown Madison, Conn.
Three of Henry’s collages recently were acquired by the U.S. State Department for the permanent collection of the new U.S. Embassy in Monrovia, Liberia. Last spring, three of his collages were acquired for the permanent collection of the LSU Museum of Art.
Henry’s work was included in an exhibition that opened on Oct. 1, 2011, at Stella Jones Gallery in New Orleans to celebrate the 100th anniversary of the birth of Mahalia Jackson. The exhibition is currently at the Dallas Museum of African American Art.
A collage by Henry also is included in the exhibition, Southern Journeys, along with works by major African-American artists. The show was featured earlier at the Alexandria Museum of Art; Appleton Museum of Art in Ocala, Fla.; Bessie Smith Cultural Center in Chattanooga, Tenn.; Wayland Baptist University in Plainview, Texas; Mosaic Templars Cultural Center in Little Rock, Ark.; and Gallery 210 in St. Louis, Mo. It opened in November 2011 at the Dallas Museum of African American Art and is showing until March at the Lauren Rogers Museum of Art in Laurel, Miss.
Kennedy is a retired professor of visual art and photography at Southeastern Louisiana University in Hammond. He creates mixed media drawings, paintings and photographs through the influences of African sculpture and designs.
In his shaped canvas paintings, Kennedy combines contemporary techniques and media to express a unique style. Kennedy has shown his works in galleries at universities, museums and art venues throughout Louisiana, Texas, Mississippi, Alabama, Georgia and New York.
Moore is a United Methodist minister and visual artist who received a bachelor of arts degree from Dillard University in New Orleans and master of divinity degree from Gammon Theological Seminary in Atlanta. Her designs and logos have been used in association with the Methodist Heritage Center and on the cover of several international publications through the United Methodist Church.
Moore has shown her paintings and collages in the Upper Room Museum in Nashville, Tenn.; Alexandria Museum of Art, Beauregard Gallery; Imani Gallery in Gretna; Dillard University; Vanguard Gallery; Greenwell Springs Branch Library; the Community Gallery at the Arts Council of Greater Baton Rouge; and galleries in St. Tammany Parish.
Opelousas Museum and Interpretive Center