African American Art and the Julius Rosenwald Fund

A Force for Change February 8—August 16, 2009 A Force for Change: African American Art and the Julius Rosenwald Fund is the first exhibition to explore the legacy of the Julius Rosenwald Fund created by the Chicago businessman and philanthropist to foster black leadership through the arts, literature, and scholarship. From 1928 to 1948, the Fund awarded stipends to hundreds of prominent and emerging African Americans artists, writers, and scholars across such disciplines as history, sociology, literature, and the visual and performing arts.

A Force for Change will present the artistic and scholarly products of Julius Rosenwald’s support, and will include more than sixty paintings, sculptures, and works on paper by twenty-two Rosenwald fellows, as well as a selection of documentary and archival materials.

Artists include: Elizabeth Catlett, Aaron Douglas, Katherine Dunham, Jacob Lawrence, Gordon Parks, Rose Piper, Augusta Savage, Charles White, and Hale Woodruff, among others. This exhibition is organized for Spertus Museum by guest curator Daniel Schulman and will travel to the Allentown Art Museum in Pennsylvania and the Montclair Art Museum in New Jersey following Spertus' presentation.