People, Locations, Episodes

Joshua Johnson, Portrait Artist born

*The birth of Joshua Johnson in c.1763 is celebrated on this date.  He was a Black artist (painter). Joshua Johnson was from the Baltimore area and had African and white-European ancestry. The son of George Johnson, a white man, and a black slave woman whose name was undocumented.  His father purchased his son from his mother’s owner for 25 […]

Prentice Polk, Portrait Photographer born

*Prentice Polk was born on this date in 1898.  He was a Black photographer and professor known for his portraits of African Americans.  Prentice Herman Polk was born in Bessemer, Alabama, the fourth child of Jacob Prentice Polk and Christine Romelia Ward. Originally named Herman Polk, he adopted his father’s name after his death and […]

Miguel Covarrubias, Artist born

*Miguel Covarrubias was born on this date in 1904.  He was a Mexican painter, caricaturist, illustrator, ethnologist, and art historian. He captured the spirit of the Harlem Renaissance in much of his work and his book, Negro Drawings.  José Miguel Covarrubias Duclaud was born in Mexico City. After graduating from the Escuela Nacional Preparatoria at […]

Rudolph Dunbar, Clarinetist and Conductor born

Rudolph Dunbar was born on this date in 1907. He was a Guyanese conductor, clarinetist, and composer.

Dunbar was born in Nabaclis, British Guyana. He was 14 when he joined the British Guiana Militia Band as a clarinet-playing apprentice. He immigrated to the United States five years later, and began studying at the Institute of Musical Art, (now the Juilliard School) in New York, where he was also involved with the Harlem jazz scene. During this time, he was a recording artist, playing clarinet solos. He also established a friendship with Black composer William Grant Still.

Samuel Felrath Hines Jr., Visual Artist, born

*Samuel Felrath Hines Jr. was born on this date in 1913.  He was a Black visual artist and art conservator.   Born in Indianapolis, Indiana, Hines began studying art in 1926 after receiving a scholarship for youth classes at the John Herron School of Art Saturday School. After graduating high school in 1931, Hines worked for the Civilian […]

Don Cherry, Jazz Artist born

This date marks the birth of Don Cherry in 1936. He was an African American musician.

Donald Eugene Cherry was born in Oklahoma City, and raised in Los Angeles. He started on trumpet in junior high school and began working with Ornette Coleman in 1956. The Coleman quartet moved to New York City in 1959, creating controversy and making revolutionary albums for Atlantic until it disbanded in late 1961. Shortly thereafter, Cherry worked with a wide array of musicians in this country and Europe: John Coltrane, Sonny Rollins, Steve Lacy, George Russell, and Albert Ayler.

James DePreist, Classical Musician born

*James DePreist was born on this date in 1936. He is an African American performer, composer, arranger, and conductor of music and poet.

The National Negro Opera Company is Founded

On this date in 1941, opera singer Mary Cardwell Dawson founded the National Negro Opera Company.

Based in Pittsburgh, the Opera Company remained in the steel city until 1960 and lasted outright until 1962.

Darwoud Bey, Photographer born

*The birth of Dawoud Bey is marked on this date in 1953.  He is a Black photographer and educator.  Born David Edward Smikle in New York City’s Jamaica, Queens neighborhood, Smikle attended PS 131 grade school and graduated from Benjamin N. Cardozo High School.  He changed his name to Dawoud Bey in the early 1970s, […]

Harolyn Blackwell, Vocalist born

*Harolyn Blackwell was born on this fate in 1955. She is an African American lyric coloratura soprano and educator.

Mark Bradford, Artist born

*Mark Bradford was born on this date in 1961. He is a Black gay artist born and raised in Leimert Park in South Los Angeles. Bradford moved with his family to a predominantly white neighborhood in Santa Monica when he was 11, but his mother still maintained her business in the old community. His mother […]

Kara Walker, Artist born

Kara Walker was born on this date in 1969. She is an African American contemporary artist known for her exploration of race, gender, sexuality, and identity in her works.

She was born in Stockton, CA. Her father was a painter and a teacher. Walker’s education includes an Master of Fine Arts (MFA) at Rhode Island School of Design in painting/printmaking, and a Bachelor of Fine Arts (BFA) in painting/printmaking at Atlanta College of Art.