Month: March 2024

Early in life, I learned that in the United States of America, there was once a “one-drop rule” determining whether a person was black (or “colored” or “Negro” in the terminology of a certain time frame). The rule specified that one ancestor with “one drop” of black blood determined you to be black.

This spring offers a bountiful bouquet of opportunities to view and experience art at the Central Arkansas Library System through exhibitions, events, and classes.

Exhibitions

The exhibition Courtesy of the Collectors: Portraits of African Americans in Photographs, Paintings, and Drawings opened in the Underground Gallery in the CALS Roberts Library in January and is in its last days.

The recent Academy Awards celebration put me in mind of the many movies filmed in—or made about—Arkansas, if only because while the state has sent forth a number of talented people who have been nominated for—and won—Oscars, the state itself has generally not been significantly represented on Oscar night.

Billy Bob Thornton received an Oscar for Sling Blade,

I’m just starting to recover from the three busy days I spent in the Research Room of the CALS Bobby L. Roberts Library of Arkansas History & Art late last year.

When I applied for the 2023 David Stricklin Fellowship, I listed about fifty collections that seemed likely to have something to do with my research topic: the Ouachita Mountains of western Arkansas (and eastern Oklahoma).