Artists/Gallerists

Lacking representation in mainstream institutions, African American artists opened their own venues in the 1960s and 1970s. Spaces such as Gallery 32, founded by painter Suzanne Jackson, and the Brockman Gallery, established by brothers Dale Brockman Davis and Alonzo Davis, a sculptor and a painter, respectively, became places to see cutting-edge work and havens for discussions, poetry readings, and fund-raisers for social causes. These spaces, and the artists who ran them, played an important role in the progressive struggles of the period while contributing to the diverse art scene in Los Angeles.

Among the most influential figures in the local arts community was Samella Lewis. She was active in Los Angeles in the 1960s as the director of education at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art and taught art history at various area universities, most importantly Scripps College in Claremont. In the 1970s Lewis also opened several important galleries—the Gallery, Gallery Tanner, and MultiCul—as well as helping to found the Museum of African American Art. Lewis championed the work of black artists through books and magazines, editing the two-volume Black Artists on Art (1969–71), establishing the magazine Black Art: An International Quarterly in 1976, and two years later publishing the book Art: African American (still in print under the title African American Art and Artists).

Suzanne Jackson founded Gallery 32 in 1968. Although it was open for only a few years, the gallery greatly contributed to Los Angeles's black art scene by exhibiting works by emerging artists while also providing a space for discussions about art, political activism, and society. Brockman Gallery, founded in 1967 by Dale Brockman Davis and Alonzo Davis, was a similar hub. Until its closing in 1989, it played a crucial role in supporting the careers of many young artists, including several of those featured in Now Dig This! This exhibition not only documents the friendships that these gallerists shared but also emphasizes their contributions as artists, which have often received much less critical attention than their gallery work.