Kerry James Marshall, artist

Kerry James Marshall is a master of the human figure. His imposing, radiant paintings and installations draw equally upon African American history and the history of Western art. Born in 1955 in Birmingham, Alabama, he moved with his family to the town of Watts in 1963, shortly before the race riots began. At Otis Art Institute in Los Angeles he studied with social realist painter Charles White. Marshall received a resident fellowship from the Studio Museum in Harlem in 1985. Two years later he and his family settled in Chicago, where he still lives and works.

Marshall's mature career can be dated to 1980, when, inspired by Ralph Ellison's Invisible Man, he developed his signature motif of a dark, near-silhouetted person. These figures of "extreme blackness," as he puts it, have been important for younger artists including Glenn Ligon and Kara Walker. From 1993 to 2006, he taught at the School of Art and Design at the University of Illinois, Chicago. In 1997, he received the MacArthur Foundation Grant, and in 2003 his work was featured at the Venice Biennale.

Last year the National Gallery acquired its first painting by Marshall. Great America (1994) reimagines a boat ride through a haunted tunnel as the Middle Passage of slaves from Africa to the New World. What might have been a work of heavy political irony becomes instead a delicate interweaving of the histories of painting and race—a screen or backdrop onto which we project our own associations with its powerful imagery.

Illustrated lectures by noted scholars and conservators of Japanese art. This program is co-organized by the Center for Advanced Study in the Visual Arts, National Gallery of Art, and the Freer Gallery of Art and the Arthur M. Sackler Gallery, Smithsonian Institution.

Presented in honor of the National Cherry Blossom Festival

The two-day public symposium begins on Friday with public lectures on issues surrounding the reinstallation of 19th-century paintings collections. On Saturday, a roundtable discussion features slide presentations by curators and specialists active in the field of 19th-century French painting.

Christiane L. Joost-Gaugier, professor emerita of art history, The University of New Mexico; scholar in residence, American University; and visiting scholar, George Washington University

Anne Markham Schulz, professor of art history and architecture, Brown University
Book signing of Woodcarving and Woodcarvers in Venice 1350–1550 follows.

Michael Fried, J. R. Herbert Boone Professor of Humanities and the History of Art, Johns Hopkins University
Book signing of Four Honest Outlaws: Sala, Ray, Marioni, Gordon follows.

Mary Morton, curator and head of the department of French paintings, National Gallery of Art

Following the opening day lecture, the French paintings department curators will be in the galleries for a question-and-answer session.

Julian Gardner, Samuel H. Kress Professor, Center for Advanced Study in the Visual Arts, National Gallery of Art

David C. Driskell, artist, collector, and emeritus professor of art history, University of Maryland at College Park; in conversation with Ruth Fine, consulting curator of special projects in modern art, National Gallery of Art

View other lectures from the Collecting of African American Art series.

Martin J. Powers, Sally Michelson Davidson Professor of Chinese Arts and Cultures and former director, Center for Chinese Studies, University of Michigan

Martin J. Powers, Sally Michelson Davidson Professor of Chinese Arts and Cultures and former director, Center for Chinese Studies, University of Michigan

Collectors of African American art and art of the African diaspora and former National Basketball Association players Elliot Perry and Darrell Walker in conversation with Michael D. Harris, associate professor of art history and African American studies, Emory University

View other lectures from the Collecting of African American Art series.

Bridget R. Cooks, associate professor of art history and African American studies, University of California, Irvine
Book signing of Exhibiting Blackness: African Americans and the American Art Museum follows.

Lecture demonstration recreating Peter Paul Rubens' Decius Mus Addressing the Legions presented by William Woodward, artist

Yukio Lippit, professor of Japanese art, Harvard University
Book signing of Colorful Realm: Japanese Bird-and-Flower Paintings by Itō Jakuchū (1716–1800) follows.

Presented in honor of the National Cherry Blossom Festival

Eric Denker, lecturer, National Gallery of Art

Rodolfo Peraza, artist, in conversation with Michelle Bird, curatorial assistant, department of French paintings, National Gallery of Art

View other lectures from the More than Ninety Miles Away series.

John Delaney, senior imaging scientist, scientific research department, National Gallery of Art

Neal Johnson, information technology specialist; G. Memo Saenz, web designer; Karen Sagstetter, senior editor, publishing office; and Arthur K. Wheelock Jr., curator of northern baroque painting, National Gallery of Art

Bridget R. Cooks, associate professor of art history and African American studies, University of California, Irvine; and Jennifer Wagelie, senior academic officer, Indiana University Art Museum

Henriette S. de Bruyn Kops, exhibitions research assistant, department of northern baroque paintings, National Gallery of Art

Glenn Perry, exhibition specialist, department of silkscreen, National Gallery of Art

Sarah Fisher, senior conservator and head of painting conservation, National Gallery of Art