Description

The Black Arts Movement (BAM) was an African-American-led art movement that was active during the 1960s and 1970s. Through activism and art, BAM created new cultural institutions and conveyed a message of black pride. The movement expanded from the accomplishments of artists of the Harlem Renaissance.

Famously referred to by Larry Neal as the "aesthetic and spiritual sister of Black Power", BAM applied these same political ideas to art and literature. and artists found new inspiration in their African heritage as a way to present the black experience in America. Artists such as Aaron Douglas, Hale Woodruff, and Meta Vaux Warrick Fuller pioneered the movement with a distinctly modernist aesthetic. This style influenced the proliferation of African American art during the twentieth century. Read more ↗