CHANGE THE JOKE AND SLIP THE YOKE
A Series of Conversations on the Use of Black Stereotypes in Contemporary Visual Practice

Released: February 23, 1998

Cambridge, Massachusetts-The Harvard University Art Museums, the Carpenter Center for Visual Arts and the W.E.B. Du Bois Institute for Afro-American Research are pleased to present the special program Change the Joke and Slip the Yoke: A Series of Conversations on the Use of Black Stereotypes in Contemporary Visual P (2 of each)t the Sackler Museum lecture hall, 485 Broadway, and Thursday, March 19 at the Carpenter Center for the Visual Arts, 24 Quincy Street. The series of four roundtable discussions is made possible through the generosity of Patricia Larsen, Lewis and Susan Manilow and the Norton Family Foundation. Admission is free, reservations are required, call (617) 496-4311 to reserve a space.

Change the Joke and Slip the Yoke will address the current debate on the recycling of racist imagery, collecting and exhibiting black memorabilia, the use of black stereotypes in the work of contemporary American artists and representations of blackness in film and theater. The distinguished group of panelists includes Steven Beyer, Nayland Blake, Michael Ray Charles, Ayoka Chenzira, Thomas Cripps, Edmund Barry Gaither, Henry Louis Gates, Jr., Kenneth W. Goings, Thelma Golden, Michael Harris, Reggie Hudlin, Isaac Julien, Phyllis Kind, Florence Ladd, David Levinthal, W.T. Lhamon, Jr., Glenn Ligon, Lewis Manilow, Gerald O'Grady, Ellen Phelan, Alison Saar, Betye Saar, Peter Schjeldahl, Lowery Sims, Melvin Van Peebles, Carrie Mae Weems and others.

Change the Joke and Slip the Yoke is being presented in conjunction with the exhibition of a work by Kara Walker at the Carpenter Center for the Visual Arts. In her provocative large-scale, 19th-century-style silhouette drawings, Walker arranges antebellum representations of African Americans in narrative tableaux, animating these stereotyped images with complicated, multiple readings. With black paper cutouts, Walker depicts such scenarios as interracial sexual encounters, bizarre acts of procreation, lynchings, and vengeful murder, drawing heavily from literary and visual caricatures of blacks found in pornography, bad historical novels, and kitschy memorabilia. Her installation on view at the Carpenter Center from March 2 through April 5, 1998 is entitled Presenting Negro Scenes Drawn Upon My Passage through the South and Reconfigured for the Benefit of Enlightened Audiences Wherever Such May be Found By Myself, Missus K.E.B. Walker, Colored, 1997. Admission to the Carpenter Center's gallery is free.

When Walker, at the age of 26, received a MacArthur Foundation "genius grant" and Robert Colescott, at age 72, was chosen to represent the United States in the 1997 Venice Bienale with his powerful, troubling parables of race, many applauded the ascendence of African American artists to claim their rightful place in the mainstream art world. However, the reaction in a significant portion of the African American art community asked "why these artists? why this work?" Were negative and degrading images of blacks being hyper-validated by an overwhelming white and eurocentric cultural establishment? Were younger artists turning their back on community and colluding in this closet racism?

A very heated, and often painfully polarized, debate has developed around these questions. "We believe that the university arena, with its tradition of open and civil exchange, is the ideal setting for exploring this debate," said Ellen Phelan, Director of the Carpenter Center. "This program should prove to be of great interest to anyone who is concerned with the implications of recycling racist imagery in contemporary art, and should go a long way to open up the discussion and to include a larger audience."

PROGRAM SCHEDULE
CHANGE THE JOKE AND SLIP THE YOKE
A Series of Conversations on the Use of Black Stereotypes in Contemporary Visual Practice

MARCH 18
Arthur M. Sackler Museum, 485 Broadway (wheelchair accessible) free, reservations required, call (617) 496-4311.
2:00 p.m. ROUGH TRADE: Collecting and Exhibiting Black Memorabilia
6:00 p.m. BLACK LIKE WHO? A Discussion of the Current Debate on the Recycling of Racist Imagery

MARCH 19 Carpenter Center for Visual Arts, 24 Quincy Street (wheelchair accessible) free, reservations required, call (617) 496-4311

2:00 p.m. SOMETHING OLD, SOMETHING NEW: The Use of Black Stereotypes in the Work of Contemporary American Artists
6:00 p.m. SHADOW AND SUBSTANCE: Representations of Blackness in Film and Theater

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The Harvard University Art Museums' facilities are wheelchair accessible. For general information, please call (617) 495-9400. For press information or photographs, please contact Kate McShea Ewen at (617) 495-2397. For more information on events, please contact the Friends, Fellows, and Special Programs Office at (617) 495-4544. World Wide Web: www.artmuseums.harvard.edu. The Harvard University Art Museums is supported in part by the Massachusetts Cultural Council.

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The Harvard University Art Museums comprise three museums (Busch-Reisinger Museum, Fogg Art Museum, Arthur M. Sackler Museum), all located on the Harvard University campus in Cambridge, MA, at the intersection of Quincy Street and Broadway, adjacent to Harvard Yard. The Art Museums are open Monday through Saturday, 10:00 a.m.-5:00 p.m., and Sunday 1:00 p.m.-5:00 p.m. Closed holidays. Admission is $5.00; $4.00 for senior citizens; $3.00 for students; free under 18 and on Saturday mornings. For special tour reservations, please call (617) 496-8576. General tours are offered Monday through Friday from September through June. The Fogg tour is at 11:00 a.m.; the Busch-Reisinger tour is at 1:00 p.m.; and the Sackler is at 2:00 p.m. -end