State Of The Arts NYC Will Host Talks Throughout 2019 On The Harlem Renaissance Celebrating Its Centennial

Curator and radio host Savona Bailey-McClain will talk with Michael Diaz-Griffith, Associate Director of the Winter Antique Show and Thomas Heneage, London-based book dealer on Saturday, January 26th at 11 am, about the sale of Le Tumulte Noir by Paul Colin. Thomas Heneage Art Books presented this rare book edition dedicated to Josephine Baker and La Revue Nègre. The book sold within hours on opening day at the Winter Antique Show at the Park Avenue Armory.

Cities across the US are planning events to commemorate the Harlem Renaissance, a historic movement that fueled the Great Black Migration and also introduced the Jazz Age shortly after WWI.

In the studio (BRIC Media) on February 5th, host McClain will interview Hilton Als, curator, Pulitzer Prize-winning theater critic and writer for the New Yorker on his exhibition of James Baldwin at the David Zwirner Gallery.

Le Tumulte Noir [Black Tumult]

43 lithographs and 2 calligraphies (letter signed by Josephine Baker) pay homage to the black artists of La Revue Nègre, a show which introduced the rhythms of jazz, the Charleston, and the enchanting personality of Josephine Baker (1906-1975) to a Parisian audience.

As well as capturing the vibrant energy of the performers, their music and of Baker at the beginning of her stardom, Colin caustically satirizes the hypocrisy of the Parisian public, who were at once condescending to, and deeply enrapture by, the African-American they came to see and hear.

The personal copy of Andre Davén, founder of La Revue Nègre, comedian, film producer, and the "great love" of American actor Rudolph Valentino.

God Made My Face: A Collective Portrait of James Baldwin

The David Zwirner Gallery in Chelsea is presenting an exhibition on James Baldwin through February 16th and curated by Hilton Als. Artists included in the exhibition are Njideka Akunyili Crosby, Diane Arbus, Richard Avedon, Alvin Baltrop, Beauford Delaney, Marlene Dumas, Ja'Tovia Gary, Glenn Ligon, Alice Neel, Cameron Rowland, Kara Walker, and James Welling, among other artists.

Baldwin is now being claimed as a kind of Oracle. But by claiming him as such, much gets erased about the great artist in the process, specifically his sexuality and aestheticism, both of which informed his politics.