Arts News: Smithsonian Will Continue To Curate Cosby Art Exhibition.

The Smithsonian Institutes Museum of African Art marches to the beat of its own drum. While media channels, Hollywood, and even Disneyworld decided to remove all things Cosby from their respective industries, the Smithsonian sees the importance of his contribution and continues to curate the Cosby Art collection, "Conversations". The Exhibition includes 62 paintings, sculptures, textile and mixed media works. It is scheduled to be on display through 2016.

During a press conference, representatives for the museum said it was aware of the recent revelations about Mr. Cosby’s controversial allegations. Although, they admittedly have not condoned his actions, the musuem firmly believes the exhibition “is fundamentally about the artworks and the artists who created them, not the owners of the collections.”

During the opening of the exhibit, Smithsonian Museum of African Art Museum director, Betsch Cole stated “At the National Museum of African Art we are excited to show the world these treasured African American artworks for the first time ever. The exhibition will encourage all of us to draw from the creativity that is Africa, to recognize the shared history that inextricably links Africa and the African diaspora and to seek the common threads that weave our stories together and over time as part of the human family.”

Smithsonian representatives also added, “The exhibition brings the public’s attention to African-American artists whose works have long been omittomitted from the study and appreciation of American art."

• Rare late 18th- and early 19th-century portraits by the Baltimore-based African American artist Joshua Johnston

• Explorations of black spirituality in the 1894 masterwork “The Thankful Poor” by Henry Ossawa Tanner and in the 1943 painting “Boy and the Candle” by South African artist Gerard Sekoto

• The struggle for freedom and equality explored through the 1989 sculpture “Toussaint Louverture et la vieille esclave” by the Senegalese artist Ousmane Sow and the 1982 painting “Still Life: Souvenir No. IV” by the African American artist Eldzier Cortor

• History, knowledge and memories explored through Cosby family quilts and African textile

• A section on music and urban life that includes African musical instruments and African and African American modern and contemporary works

Tanner. The Thankful Poor. oil. c.1894

Mr. Cosby stated, “It’s so important to show art by African American artists in this exhibition at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of African Art,” said Bill Cosby. “To me, it’s a way for people to see what exists and to give voice to many of these artists who were silenced for so long, some of whom will speak no more.”