RISD Museum object photography generally follows typical museum practice: a straightforward approach to framing and lighting with great concern for color fidelity. For *Artist/Rebel/Dandy*, the curators suggested that we go in a different direction.
RISD student Tito Crichton-Stuart analyzes Robert Mapplethorpe’s exoticisation of the black body and proposes potential acquisitions that could serve as counterpoints in the collection
Artist and student Jade Cannata creates a chart describing the racial demographics of three all-inclusive resorts in locations with strong historical connections to colonialism, showing the effects of history on the present
A student in a RISD course on pan-African aesthetics contemplates a vinyl record pictured in a Sanlé Sory photograph in the collection, and imagines the songs it contains.
Juxtaposing Iké Udé’s photography with Sun Ra’s notions of "mythocracy" and Black Utopia, Ann-Maree Quaynor seeks to reclaim Black Dignity and Existence.
A student in a RISD course on pan-African aesthetics, inspired by a photograph in the collection, explores Black youth occupying space in movements from La Sape to Noirwave.
Unfinished paintings by Eastman Johnson, John Singer Sargent and Mary Cassatt reveal new techniques that emerged in France in the second half of the 19th century.
Richard Merkin was for decades the go-to authority for all things dandyish. As we see in the ephemera from his life and his tailored clothing on view in the exhibition "Artist/Rebel/Dandy", his personality and fashion sense live on at RISD.
This late fifteenth-century Virgin and Child was created with subtlety, flexibility, and portability in mind. These features were central to its medieval use—and its use at the RISD Museum.
