ABSTRACT
Oral histories and the personal archives of black artists are central to expanding the discursive strategies that have heretofore shaped the historiography of African American and African Diaspora art in the United States. Published posthumously, the studio notes and writings of artist Jack Whitten provide ample ammunition for the critique of the effectiveness of art historical periodization and genre. The black archive David C. Driskell assembled at Fisk, housed in the art department, was greatly inspired by the institutional collecting of Arna Wendell Bontemps, Fisk University’s head librarian from 1943–1965. The research for a more comprehensive history of black artistic practice will depend on just such private archives and the generosity of their caretakers, including the scholars who learn from them. The Archives of American Art was founded at the Detroit Institute of Arts in 1954, and initially as a microfilm repository of collections located elsewhere.
