The Women Gather: Black Patrons Forge Deep Healing in Art Spaces
Museums are under attack, but Black women curators, artists, and patrons are still nourishing themselves and each other through the arts.
“We realize that the only people who care enough about us to work consistently for our liberation are us. Our politics evolve from a healthy love for ourselves, our sisters and our community which allows us to continue our struggle and work.” — Combahee River Collective statement, 1977
Two weeks after the Eaton and Palisades wildfires claimed 31 lives and battered nearly 40,000 acres across my beloved Southern California, I found myself in a familiar place: the museum.
Amid one of the state’s deadliest fires, which decimated Black neighborhoods and generations of life, I returned home to Los Angeles for a funeral. The year was young, but I had already spent most of it deep in grief. In the midst of funeral planning, one of my close girlfriends accepted my invitation to an afternoon “museum hour” at the California African American Museum (CAAM).
We walked and talked every inch of the “World Without End: The George Washington Carver Project” exhibit celebrating the scientist-artist’s agricultural innovations. That hour flew by as we gave way for our nervous systems to rest and lay down our weary souls.
“I’m truly a believer that where our stories are and where we convene, there is healing,” says Black Girls in Arts Spaces founder Kaci Merriwether-Hawkins. “So in a museum, in the park, in the grocery store, I feel like we are a very healing community. When we come together, there is power, there is love.”
Whether solo or in communion with other Black women, it is not at all hyperbole for me to say that time and time again, I have found salvation in art museums.