Viewing page 13 of 57

This transcription has been completed. Contact us with corrections.

COLEMAN 13

others, emerged. At Arkansas State College in Pine Bluff, John Howard, another product of the Outhouse School, headed the art program. One of the first art majors to graduate was Jeff Donaldson. Donaldson later attended the Illinois Institute of Technology and North-western University and was one of the founding members of the highly influential AFRICOBRA Group. In 1970, while at North-western, Donaldson organized CONFABA, one of the most important conferences ever held in the history of Afro-American art.

Black colleges in the South have played a vital role in introducing aspiring artists to formal instruction over the past six decades. To be sure, the Atlanta University Annual Exhibition provided an opportunity for Black artists to show their work and compete for prizes when other galleries, museums and and artists' competitions were closed to them. Opportunities to teach art at white universities were not available to Aaron Douglas, Hale Woodruff, Elizabeth Prophet, Elizabeth Catlett, therefore they went to Black institutions such as Fisk, Atlanta University, Dillard and Hampton. Black colleges and universities helped to forge a fine arts tradition by broadening the base of formally trained artists and they also helped develop a distinct body of work that reflected the South as a sense of place.