Richard J. Powell

John Spencer Bassett Distinguished Professor of Art and Art History

Education

Ph.D., Yale University 1988
M.Phil., Yale University 1984
M.A., Yale University 1982
M.F.A., Howard University 1977
B.A., Morehouse College 1975

Overview

Richard J. Powell is John Spencer Bassett Professor of Art & Art History at Duke University, where he has taught since 1989. He studied at Morehouse College and Howard University before earning his doctorate in art history at Yale University. Along with teaching courses in American art, the arts of the African Diaspora, and contemporary visual studies, he has written extensively on topics ranging from primitivism to postmodernism, including such titles as Homecoming: The Art and Life of William H. Johnson (1991), Black Art: A Cultural History (1997 & 2002), and Cutting a Figure: Fashioning Black Portraiture (2008).

Expertise

African American art, African art, art of the United States

Contact Information

114 Buchanan Blvd, Smith Warehouse, Bay 9, A287c, Durham, NC 27708

Box 90766, Durham, NC 27708

(919) 684-2473

richard.powell@duke.edu

Links

http://www.richardjpowell.com

Projects

Cutting a Figure:...

Examining portraits of black people over the past two centuries, Cutting a Figure argues that these images should be viewed as a distinct category of portraiture that differs... read more »

Powell, Richard. Archibald Motley Jazz Age Modernist. 2015.

Powell, Richard J. African American Art: Harlem Renaissance, Civil Rights Era and Beyond. Washington, DC: Smithsonian American Art Museum, 2012.

Powell, Richard J. Ras Ishi/Secret Diaries. Miller Publishing Company, Ltd., 2009.

Powell, Richard J. Who Am I in This Picture? Amherst College Portraits. Amherst College, 2009.

Powell, R. J. Cutting a Figure: Fashioning Black Portraiture. University of Chicago Press, 2008.

Powell, R. J. Circle Dance: The Art of John T. Scott. University Press of Mississippi, 2005.

Powell, R. J. Black Art: A Cultural History. London: Thames and Hudson, Ltd., 2002.

Powell, R. J. Beauford Delaney: The Color Yellow. High Museum of Art, 2002.

Powell, R. J. To Conserve a Legacy: American Art from Historically Black Colleges and Universities. MIT Press, 1999.

Powell, R. J. Jacob Lawrence. New York: Rizzoli International Publications, Inc., 1992.

Pages

Powell, Richard. “Raymond Saunders.” Among Others Blackness at MoMA, edited by Darby English and Charlotte Barat, 2019.

Powell, Richard. “Herve Telemaque.” Among Others: Blackness at MoMA, edited by Darby English and Charlotte Barat, Museum of Modern Art, 2019.

Powell, Richard. “Black Parnassus: Chicago in the Interwar Years.” Gordon Parks The New Tide, Early Work 1940-1950, edited by Philip Brookman, Steidl/Gordon Parks Foundation/National Gallery of Art, 2018, pp. 259–65.

Powell, R. J. “"Porch and Drawl".” Southern Accent: Seeking the American South in Contemporary Art, edited by Miranda Lash and Trevor Schoonmaker, Nasher Museum of Art at Duke University, 2016, pp. 106–19.

Powell, R. J. “"Wounded Zouave and the Cyrenian Paradigm".” The Civil War in Art and Memory, edited by Kirk Savage, National Gallery of Art, 2016, pp. 65–80.

Powell, R. J. “"I Talismani di Betye Saar".” Betye Saar: Uneasy Dancer, edited by Mario Marinetti, Fondazione Prada, 2016, pp. 233–41.

Powell, R. J. “"Les ames illustrees: W. E. B. Du Bois dans l'art contemporain".” The Color Line: Les Artistes Africains-Americains et La Segregation, edited by Daniel Soutif, Flammarion, 2016, pp. 74–85.

Powell, R. J. “Probability Theory: David Hammons's Money Tree.” Open This End: Contemporary Art from the Collection of Blake Byrne, edited by R. J. Wolin, Joseph R., The Skylark Foundation, 2015, pp. 42–49.

Powell, R. J. “"Dem Shoes": Thomas Hart Benton's Romance.” American Epics: Thomas Hart Benton and Hollywood, edited by A. Bailly, Delmonico Books - Prestel, 2015, pp. 83–87.

Powell, R. J. “New Negroes, Harlem, and Jazz (1900-1950).” The Image of the Black in Western Art, edited by D. Bindman and H. L. Gates, Harvard University Press, 2014, pp. 53–104.

Pages

Powell, Richard J. “The Brown Paper Bag Test.” Nka Journal of Contemporary African Art, vol. 2018, no. 42–43, Duke University Press, Nov. 2018, pp. 234–49. Crossref, doi:10.1215/10757163-7185905. Full Text

Oliver, V. C., and R. J. Powell. “Reminiscing: Valerie Cassel Oliver and Richard J. Powell in conversation.” Callaloo, vol. 40, no. 5, Jan. 2017, pp. 53–162. Scopus, doi:10.1353/cal.2017.0167. Full Text

Powell, Richard J. “Who’s Zoomin’ Who?: The Eyes of Donyale Luna.” Nka Journal of Contemporary African Art, vol. 2016, no. 38–39, Duke University Press, Nov. 2016, pp. 14–21. Crossref, doi:10.1215/10757163-3641634. Full Text

Oliver, Valerie Cassell, and Richard J. Powell. “"Richard Powell/'Say it Loud': An Interview with Richard Powell by Valerie Cassel Oliver".” Callaloo, vol. 38, no. 4, Johns Hopkins University Press, 2016, pp. 985–95.

Powell, Richard J. “Rechercher et imaginer l’art « black » américain depuis 2005.” Perspective, no. 2, OpenEdition, Dec. 2015, pp. 81–94. Crossref, doi:10.4000/perspective.6159. Full Text Open Access Copy

Powell, Richard J. “Emancipation and the Freed in American Sculpture.” Art Bulletin, vol. 95, no. 4, Dec. 2013, pp. 646–49.

Powell, Richard J. “Freeman Henry Morris Murray: Emancipation and the Freed in American Sculpture.” The Art Bulletin, vol. 95, Dec. 2013, pp. 646–49.

Powell, Richard J. “The Woodshed.” Studies in the History of Art, vol. 71, 2011, pp. 199–206.

Powell, Richard J. “'Paint That Thing!' Aaron Douglas's Call to Modernism.” American Studies, vol. 46, 2010, pp. 107–19.

Powell, Richard J. “The Picturesque, Miss Nottage and the Caribbean Sublime.” Small Axe: A Caribbean Journal of Criticism, vol. 25, Feb. 2008, pp. 157–68.