Adolphus Ealey

{{Infobox person

| name = Adolphus Ealey

| birth_date = February 22, 1941

| birth_place = Atlanta, Georgia, U.S.

| death_date = November 11, 1992

| death_place = Washington, D.C., U.S.

| occupation = Artist, curator, educator, writer, entrepreneur, art dealer

| spouse = Howard University,
Académie de la Grande Chaumière,
University of Wisconsin–Madison

}}

Adolphus Ealey (1941–1992) was an American artist, curator, educator, writer, and entrepreneur. He was African-American and a noted Black art authority, and he was the longtime curator of the Barnett–Aden Collection of Black art.{{Cite book |last= |first= |chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=u8IDAAAAMBAJ&pg=PA54 |title=Jet (magazine) |date=1992-12-07 |publisher=Johnson Publishing Company |pages=54 |language=en |chapter=Noted Black Art Authority Adolphus Ealey, 51, Dies}}{{Cite news |date=1991-04-07 |title=Inheriting a talent |pages=70 |work=Tampa Bay Times |url=https://www.newspapers.com/article/tampa-bay-times-inheriting-a-talent/124997807/ |access-date=2023-05-20}}

Early life and education

Adolphus Ealey was born on February 22, 1941, in Atlanta, Georgia.{{Cite book |last1=Etinde-Crompton |first1=Charlotte |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=yazXDwAAQBAJ&pg=PA82 |title=Alma Woodsey Thomas: Painter and Educator |last2=Crompton |first2=Samuel Willard |date=2019-12-15 |publisher=Enslow Publishing |isbn=978-1-9785-1469-0 |page=82 |language=en}} He attended Howard University (B.A. degree 1963) and studied under James V. Herring. He received a master's degree (1964) at Académie de la Grande Chaumière in Paris,{{Cite book |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=PUUOAQAAMAAJ |title=Who's Who Among Black Americans |date=1994 |publisher=Who's Who Among Black Americans, Incorporated, Publishing Company |isbn=978-0-8103-5461-6 |pages=426 |language=en}} and a Ph.D. in art from the University of Wisconsin.

Career

{{Quote box

| quote = "All things are interrelated and nourish one another. All cultures are interwoven."

| author = – Adolphus Ealey (in 1991){{Cite book |last= |first= |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Jt3arUBfnCgC&pg=PA13 |title=Tampa Bay Magazine |date=August 1991 |publisher=Tampa Bay Publications, Inc. |language=en |page=13}}

| width = 20%

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Ealey was a longtime curator of the Barnett–Aden Collection of Black art starting in 1969; the collection was formerly associated with Barnett-Aden Gallery and bequeathed to Ealey by James V. Herring.{{Cite web |title=Barnett Aden Gallery, African American Heritage Trail |url=https://www.culturaltourismdc.org/portal/barnett-aden-gallery-african-american-heritage-trail |access-date=2023-05-20 |website=Cultural Tourism DC}}{{Cite news |last=Peterman |first=Peggy |date=1992-12-29 |title=A bruising year of African-American adversity |pages=29 |work=Tampa Bay Times |url=https://www.newspapers.com/article/tampa-bay-times-a-bruising-year-of-afric/124998773/ |access-date=2023-05-20}} Later the collection was located at the Museum of African American Art in Tampa, Florida (which has since closed).{{Cite journal |last=Bush |first=Teresia |date=2022 |title=Barnett-Aden Gallery |url=http://dx.doi.org/10.5040/9781350924390.2327130 |journal=Bloomsbury Art Markets |doi=10.5040/9781350924390.2327130|isbn=9781350924390 |url-access=subscription }}{{Cite news |last=Ross |first=Sandy |date=1991-04-28 |title=Curator's dedication infuses museum's collection with vitality |pages=30 |work=The Tampa Tribune |url=https://www.newspapers.com/article/the-tampa-tribune-curators-dedication-i/124997906/ |access-date=2023-05-20}} He took an anthropological approach to the collection of objects, emphasized culture and organized them around a village concept.{{Cite book |last=Beurden |first=Sarah Van |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=7POmCwAAQBAJ&pg=PT245 |title=Authentically African: Arts and the Transnational Politics of Congolese Culture |date=2015-11-25 |publisher=Ohio University Press |isbn=978-0-8214-4545-7 |pages=245 |language=en}}

Ealey was a professor at Washington Technical Institute (now University of the District of Columbia) from 1969 to 1971. He also taught art classes at Sharpe Health School in Washington, D.C., a school for children with disabilities, from 1972 to 1975. From 1976 to 1978, Ealey was the first director of the Afro-American Cultural and Historical Museum of Philadelphia (now the African American Museum in Philadelphia).

In 1985, he designed memorabilia for the first national celebration of Martin Luther King Jr. Day, commissioned by the King Center for Nonviolent Social Change; and it was said to have been personally approved by Coretta Scott King, the widow of Martin Luther King, Jr..{{Cite book |last= |first= |chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=prQDAAAAMBAJ&pg=PA19 |title=Jet (magazine) |date=1985-08-26 |publisher=Johnson Publishing Company |volume=68 |page=19 |language=en |chapter=Posters, Pins and More to Celebrate King's Day |issn=0021-5996 |issue=24}}

He was the president of Heritage Noir Inc. in 1983. Ealey had been friends with artist Alma W. Thomas.

Death and legacy

He had AIDS and died of kidney failure on November 11, 1992, at Providence Hospital in Washington, D.C..{{Cite news |title=Adolphus Ealey, Authority On Black Art, Dies At 51 |language=en-US |newspaper=The Washington Post |url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/local/1992/11/16/adolphus-ealey-authority-on-black-art-dies-at-51/11e9adc9-c80a-4dfb-9dc2-d122d03d9880/ |access-date=2023-05-20 |issn=0190-8286}} He has artist files at the National Gallery of Art Library;{{Cite web |title=Adolphus Ealey: vertical files. |url=https://library.nga.gov/discovery/fulldisplay?&context=L&vid=01NGA_INST:NGA&search_scope=MainLibrary&tab=MainLibrary&docid=alma993692443504896 |access-date=2023-05-20 |website=National Gallery of Art Library |language=en}} and he is included in the public museum collection at the Baltimore Museum of Art.{{Cite web |title=Dr. Adolphus Ealey |url=https://collection.artbma.org/people/31468/dr-adolphus-ealey |access-date=2023-05-20 |website=Baltimore Museum of Art |language=en}}

Exhibitions

1972, Reflections: the Afro-American Artist: an Exhibit of Paintings, Sculpture, and Graphics, group exhibition, Benton Convention Center, Winston-Salem, North Carolina{{Cite web |title=Ealey, Adolphus |url=http://216.197.120.164/artistbibliog.cfm?id=1649 |archive-url=https://wayback.archive-it.org/4472/20210320052527/http://216.197.120.164/artistbibliog.cfm?id=1649 |archive-date=March 20, 2021 |access-date=2023-05-20 |website=African American Visual Artists Database (AAVAD)}}
1973, Exhibition 73 (the D.C. Art Association), group exhibition, Anacostia Museum, and Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture
1977, Black American Art from the Barnett Aden Collection, group exhibition, Frick Fine Arts Museum at the University of Pittsburgh
1979, Reflections of a Southern Heritage: 20th Century Black Artists of the Southeast, group exhibition, Gibbes Art Gallery, Charlestown, South Carolina

Publications

{{Cite journal |last=Ealey |first=Adolphus |date=Spring 1977 |editor-last=Lewis |editor-first=Samella |editor-link=Samella Lewis |title=The Curator |url=https://online.hamptonu.edu/product/black-art-an-international-quarterly-vol-1-no-3-1977-2/ |journal=Black Art: An International Quarterly |volume=1 |issue=3}}

References

External links

[https://library.nga.gov/permalink/01NGA_INST/1cl1g8d/alma993692443504896 Adolphus Ealey: vertical files] at National Gallery of Art Library
[https://www.aaa.si.edu/collections/items/detail/interview-adolphus-ealey-18771 Interview with Adolphus Ealey, 1978 June 30], from Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution
[https://nmaahc.si.edu/object/nmaahc_A2014.63.32 The Historical Records of the Barnett-Aden Gallery], from the Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture

Category:1941 births

Category:1992 deaths

Category:20th-century African-American painters

Category:20th-century American painters

Category:20th-century American male artists

Category:People from Atlanta

Category:20th-century people from Washington, D.C.

Category:People from Delray Beach, Florida

Category:Howard University alumni

Category:University of Wisconsin–Madison alumni

Category:African-American curators

Category:American curators