Wednesday, February 11, 10:30AM–1PM
William Grant Still Arts Center
2520 S. West View Street, LA, CA 90016
Max Participants: 25
Free
Please join us for a private workshop and tour of the 45th Annual Black Doll Show, Sower of Seeds: Creating A New Tomorrow at the William Grant Still Arts Center, led by their resident artist Adrienne DeVine. Participants will create simple handmade dolls and take a guided tour connecting contemporary making practices to the long legacy of dollmaking, storytelling, and self-representation. The experience centers care, creativity, and reflection, while engaging the history and cultural significance of dolls within Black communities.
Adrienne DeVine is a Pasadena-based mixed media artist whose work spans installations, collage, wire sculpture, and handmade books. Her practice explores history, cultural heritage, indigenous worldviews, and materiality, centering Black narratives and artistic expression. She has exhibited at the California African American Museum and throughout greater Los Angeles, and has contributed to the Smithsonian Center for Folklife and Cultural Heritage’s African American Craft Initiative.
The Black Doll Show at the William Grant Still Arts Center was started in the 1980s by the Friends of William Grant Still Arts Center, with contemporary artist/curator Cecil Fergerson (1931-2013) as its first curator. It was inspired by a doll test conducted by Mamie and Kenneth Clark in the 1940s. The tests concluded that, due to social stigmas, many African-American children preferred white dolls over Black dolls. This test went on to become evidence in civil rights lawsuits. The Clarks became expert witnesses in Brown vs. Board of Education, helping to create the landmark decision to desegregate schools. This doll test was conducted again in 2006 by 17-year-old filmmaker Kiri Davis, sadly with the same results. The Black Doll Show is an annual winter tradition at WGSAC to support positive self-image today, which remains challenging for Africans and all people of color within the continent and in diaspora.