Moca museum black frames5/29/2023 ![]() ![]() The museum is focused on operating in a new world, Reich said.Ī new world that’s looking for more than a seat at the table. “So, how do we develop programs that engage those historically overlooked constituencies to come in and feel welcome? With Megan's leadership, with the board’s crystal focus on that, I think our best days are ahead of us.” “We're in this very critical time right now,” he said. That seat was covered with scattered $100 bills, carrying the message that only those with privilege get to sit down. The centerpiece was a table with a single seat. The work was installed in a room painted white, with illustrations and personal objects from Washington’s life hanging on the walls. The piece explored the struggle of underrepresented artists to have a voice in the mainstream art world. As it turns out, the work was the victim of a bit of controversy itself. Washington’s piece was installed in an offsite gallery on Cleveland’s West Side. “LaTanya first believed in the work that I was doing as an artist,” Washington said. ![]() He called his installation “And Yeah, About That Seat at the Table.” “There was a fair degree of soul searching, to use a kind of cliched term, but also a lot of very hard, honest conversation among a variety of individuals to understand where we needed to go and how we might approach getting there,” Reich said.Īntwoine Washington was one of the artists in the exhibition La Tanya Autry curated last year. Reich actually started at the museum as an intern in 2001, and she worked her way up through a variety of positions, culminating in her new appointment. “ Imagine Otherwise is a limited, yet hopefully, significant prodding for an authentic, community-led institutional reckoning of moCa Cleveland…” “Autry envisions possibilities beyond moCa Cleveland’s consistent antiBlack practices…” “And how is that? What do we do? We make certain that people that are being exhibited in this space are representational of that in the community.”Ĭriticism of moCa even hung from gallery walls, as part of an exhibition by former curatorial fellow La Tanya Autry, called “Imagine Otherwise.” Alongside a collection of paintings, film loops and other images were signs that read, in part: “It's important for people to feel welcome in coming into these doors,” she said. Jones, the moCa board’s third co-president, said that the museum needs to promote a feeling of diversity and inclusion. The museum is rolling out several changes to evolve its reputation.Īudra T. “Art institutions, it goes without saying, they've had a reputation,” said Stephen Sokany, board co-president at moCa. Many museums are facing similar issues, here and across the country. And its longtime director Jill Snyder resigned to make way for cultural change at moCa. ![]() The museum canceled an exhibition depicting police violence against people of color. Questions were raised about the museum’s past openness to its non-white staff and visitors. “We had various things that happened in moCa that were problematic,” said Joanne Cohen, board co-president at moCa. When a racial reckoning spread across the country in the spring of 2020, moCa faced its own sort of reckoning. Cleveland’s Museum of Contemporary Art, also known as moCa, has had a reputation for going against the grain for more than a half century.
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