Romare Bearden Foundation

09/04/2026

CONJUR 2026 HONOREE SPOTLIGHT: PEG ALSTON

For more than five decades, Peg Alston has played a vital role in building recognition, audiences, and a market for African American art.

Through Peg Alston Fine Arts, she has championed work by generations of artists, from Elizabeth Catlett, Jacob Lawrence, Charles White, and Faith Ringgold to leading contemporary artists including Carrie Mae Weems.

Peg’s relationship to Romare Bearden makes this honor especially meaningful. Bearden and Norman Lewis served as mentors during the formative years of her career, and remained supporters of her commitment to advancing African American art.

We are proud to honor Peg at the Romare Bearden Foundation’s CONJUR: A Masked Affair on Thursday, October 29. She will be introduced by acclaimed artist Carrie Mae Weems, whose work is among the many Peg has championed throughout her extraordinary career.

Peg joins fellow 2026 honorees Howardena Pindell and Claude Grunitzky for an evening celebrating art, culture, community, and the continuing legacy of Romare Bearden.

🎟️ Tickets are available now, and sponsorship opportunities are still available for individuals and organizations interested in supporting the Foundation’s work.

Learn more, reserve tickets, or explore sponsorship opportunities:
bit.ly/Conjur26

Please share and help us celebrate Peg!

09/02/2026

Happy Birthday Romare Bearden!! September 2, 1911 - Charlotte, NC. Master painter, collagist, educator, author, lyricist, advocate, Harlemite. Images: Bearden as child with grandparents and great grandparents 2. Rehearsal Hall watercolor collage 3. Pittsburgh Memory, 1964 collage 4. Bearden at exhibition

08/24/2026

THIS WEDNESDAY | Tschabalala Self on Art, Identity, and the Power of Representation

Join the Romare Bearden Foundation on Wednesday, August 26 for a special edition of the Cinque Artist Talks, featuring internationally acclaimed artist Tschabalala Self in conversation with arts writer, curator, and author Halima Taha.

Self’s distinctive practice spans painting, collage, sculpture, and textiles, using the Black figure to explore identity, representation, and the possibilities of contemporary visual culture.

This conversation will consider the evolving tradition of Black figuration, how artists are redefining representation today, and the ways artists across generations have used visual language to imagine Black life with complexity and freedom.

Inspired by the legacies of Romare Bearden and the historic Cinque Gallery, the evening connects an important artistic history with the work being made now.

📅 Wednesday, August 26, 2026
💻 Virtual

Register today: tinyurl.com/Cinque826

Know someone who would enjoy this conversation? Share this post and invite them to join us.

08/18/2026

A special visit from St. Louis to New York! ✨

We recently welcomed Daniella Statia, the 2025–2027 Romare Bearden Graduate Museum Fellow at the Saint Louis Art Museum, to the Romare Bearden Foundation in NYC.

During her visit, Daniella spent time with Foundation Co-Directors Diedra Harris-Kelley and Johanne Bryant-Reid, learning more about the Foundation’s work and contributing her own expertise along the way. Her visit included hands-on work in the Foundation’s storage facility completing condition reports, conversations around organizational strategy, and consultation on an ongoing digital asset management project.

Daniella brings a rich background in art history and museum studies to the fellowship. She earned her MA in Art History from Tulane University, focusing on Blackness and Indigeneity in modern art of the Americas, and previously helped curate the University of Delaware’s online **Black Portrait Photography Collection**.

The Romare Bearden Graduate Museum Fellowship provides emerging museum professionals with hands-on experience across the field—and we were delighted to have Daniella spend part of that experience with us in New York.

Thank you, Daniella, for the thoughtful conversation, collaboration, and care you brought to the Foundation!

08/13/2026

The masks are coming out. ✨

This fall, CONJUR: A Masked Affair returns for an evening celebrating art, imagination, community—and the enduring creative spirit of Romare Bearden.

Inspired by Bearden’s world of ritual, memory, transformation, and possibility, CONJUR brings the Foundation’s community together for one unforgettable night.

Thursday, October 29, 2026

Join the Romare Bearden Foundation in New York City for CONJUR: A Masked Affair.

Know someone who should be there? Share this invitation with them.

🎟 Tickets are available now: bit.ly/Conjur26

08/12/2026

What does it mean to represent Black life on your own terms?

On Wednesday, August 26, the Romare Bearden Foundation welcomes internationally acclaimed artist elf for a special edition of our Cinque Artist Talks series.

Known for a bold, inventive practice spanning painting, collage, sculpture, and textiles, Self will join arts writer, curator, and author for a conversation on art, identity, and the power of representation.

Together, they’ll explore the evolving tradition of Black figuration, the ways contemporary artists are reshaping visual language, and how artists across generations have claimed space to imagine Black life with complexity, freedom, and possibility.

The conversation takes inspiration from the legacy of Romare Bearden and the historic Cinque Gallery—connecting past and present through the artists who continue to expand what representation can mean.

📅 Wednesday, August 26, 2026
💻 Virtual

Registration at: tinyurl.com/Cinque826 (Link in bio)

08/04/2026

Christopher Nolan’s The Odyssey is now in theaters, bringing Homer’s ancient epic to IMAX screens. But nearly fifty years ago, Romare Bearden had already transformed the story—using collage to create a distinctly Black and profoundly universal vision of journey, displacement, endurance, and homecoming.

Created in 1977, Bearden’s Black Odyssey comprises twenty collage compositions inspired by Homer’s poem, accompanied by related watercolors and later screenprints. Bearden made every figure Black—from Odysseus and Penelope to the gods, monsters, and adversaries—and relocated the story within the visual world of Benin.

The result was not simply an illustration of Homer. It was a new cultural conversation.

Throughout his career, Bearden returned to travelers: people leaving home, remembering home, searching for home, and finding themselves changed by the journey. In Black Odyssey, that lifelong concern meets the history of African-American migration and displacement—and the universal human longing to belong somewhere.

In Home to Ithaca, Bearden even rewrites the moment of arrival. Homer’s Odysseus reaches Ithaca asleep. Bearden’s stands at the bow of his ship, facing the destination that endurance has finally brought within reach.

“Life is going to triumph somehow.”

Explore Bearden’s world and discover how his art continues to transform the stories we thought we knew.

07/29/2026

SAVE THE DATE! Another Masked Affair! October 29, 2026 City Winery, NYC

Explore Romare Bearden: Artist – Activist – Visionary, a national touring exhibition showcasing the iconic 20th-century artist’s groundbreaking collages, prints, and archival materials. Now booking through 2027—bring Bearden’s legacy to your museum. Contact us today!

07/29/2026

Two works from Bearden's Odysseus series made the list in this piece on "Five Epic Artworks to see after Christopher Nolan's The Odyssey" film. Bearden has been making Homer's classic a tale about the "Every Man" since the 1970s.

Over centuries, artists have found inspiration in Homer’s epic. These are the artworks that draw on the themes of “The Odyssey.”

07/29/2026

Flashback to May 19 at Cannes... The Romare Bearden Film documentary Producer expressing a personal connection to the project.