Contemporary art those of African descent has been a distinctive area of collecting and patronage since the 1980s. Capturing collective identity and memory, struggles, and freedom, black art features life experience, culture, and the street, while engaging in dialogue on art and identity.
Bernard Lumpkin and Cramine Boccuzzi have emerged as leading collectors and patrons of black contemporary art. Their family collection is the subject of a new publication titled ‘Young Gifted, and Black.’ As patrons, they seek to support progress for black art, and to ensure that skin color, gender, and sexual orientation are not barriers to make an impact. The collection is installed in their loft in Tribeca where they live with their three children, Felix, Lucy, and Zachary.
Black art is making headlines today, and museums are eager to diversify their collections. What better time to explore ways to collect works by artists of African descent. I have visited Lumpkin and Boccuzzi at their home to explore the work of two artists, Christina Quarles and D’Angelo Lovell Williams, whose art is a personal documentation of their own narrative, black, and gender identity.
The Collector, Fall 2020
Collecting Black Contemporary Art
With Bernard Lumpkin at the Lumpkin-Boccuzzi Family Collection of Contemporary Art, NY.
This series is supported by Rago/Wright, specializing in the sale of Fine Art, Design, Ceramics, and Glass at Auction.
Bernard Lumpkin and Cramine Boccuzzi have emerged as leading collectors and patrons of black contemporary art. Their family collection is the subject of a new publication titled ‘Young Gifted, and Black.’ As patrons, they seek to support progress for black art, and to ensure that skin color, gender, and sexual orientation are not barriers to make an impact. The collection is installed in their loft in Tribeca where they live with their three children, Felix, Lucy, and Zachary.
Black art is making headlines today, and museums are eager to diversify their collections. What better time to explore ways to collect works by artists of African descent. I have visited Lumpkin and Boccuzzi at their home to explore the work of two artists, Christina Quarles and D’Angelo Lovell Williams, whose art is a personal documentation of their own narrative, black, and gender identity.
The Collector, Fall 2020
Collecting Black Contemporary Art
With Bernard Lumpkin at the Lumpkin-Boccuzzi Family Collection of Contemporary Art, NY.
This series is supported by Rago/Wright, specializing in the sale of Fine Art, Design, Ceramics, and Glass at Auction.
Creator & Executive Director: Daniella Ohad
Producers: Daniella Ohad and Howard Silver
Director of Photography: Scott Sinkles
Music: Arthur Hernandez
Editor: Howard Silver
Hair Stylist: Kara Giargia
Makeup: Charivari & Co.
Tunji Adeniyi-Jones Blue Dancer, 2017 Oil on canvas, 68 × 54 in. © Tunji Adeniyi-Jones.
D’Angelo Lovell Williams The Lovers, 2017 Pigment print, 20 × 30 in. © D’Angelo Lovell Williams, courtesy the artist and Higher Pictures.
Chiffon Thomas A mother who had no mother, 2018. © Chiffon Thomas. Embroidery floss, acrylic paint, and canvas on window screen, 57 × 44 ½ in.
Henry Taylor Rock It, 2012 Five cardboard boxes (King Cobra premium malt), acrylic on foam mannequin head, and wood, 80 ½ × 12 × 36 in. © Henry Taylor.
