San Francisco Chronicle - (Sunday)

How museums must evolve.

Berkeley sculptor talks about race, museums and moving toward equity

- By Tony Bravo not Tony Bravo is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: tbravo@ sfchronicl­e.com

Mildred Howard is known globally for her awardwinni­ng work as a sculptor and assemblage artist who frequently takes everyday objects and imbues them with greater meaning and depth in her revisionin­g and recontextu­alizing.

The work often takes the form of structures and shelters, like her 2011 installati­on “The House That Will Not Pass for Any Color Than Its Own,” a shedlike constructi­on presented last year in New York’s Battery Park. Her visual language has often explored ideas of identity, history and the significan­ce of memory.

Anglim/Trimble gallery recently featured work by Howard in a solo show, “Look Through to the Otherside,” and she is currently the lead artist on the new Southeast Community Center project in San Francisco’s Bayview district.

Howard, a lifelong South Berkeley resident, spoke to The Chronicle about diversifyi­ng representa­tion in museums, society’s ongoing racial reckoning and how she thinks the art world needs to evolve to be more truly equitable.

Q: What has your experience as a Black woman been like in the art world?

A: I have this part of me called ART. I love it because I couldn’t do it, but it’s also difficult to make a living doing it.

I’m a Black woman living in the United States of America and in the world. I’m no more special than those who are living outside my studio, who I see walking up and down the streets all day long, people that looked like me that don’t have a job, living on the street.

The whole thing about race is

made up; it’s a social construct, but it could be used against you. When we look at museums or any of the arts institutio­ns across the globe, only recently were any artists of color being mentioned at all. And if you saw an image of a Black person, it was in a servitude manner.

Q: Do you see the art world as a microcosm for society’s issues with race?

A: Yes. And money. Money talks. But that also is a part of the bigger picture because look who has money and who doesn’t have it.

Being an artist gives me a voice to say what I want to say, and I don’t always benefit from speaking out. Q: Talk to me about going into museums and not seeing other Black people or work by Black artists.

A: Sometimes, I’m the only one. But this whole thing is just bigger. It’s the lies that have been perpetuate­d for years, since this country was built, in almost every aspect of it. If one can go through, up until recently, the educationa­l system and only see a few people that look like me and had melanin in their skin there. ... There it is, right there. I probably had in my early education, maybe two African American teachers, maybe three. And if I didn’t take it upon myself to do independen­t study in graduate school with people of color, I would not have had any.

Q: Did seeing work by Black artists help you envision yourself in the art world?

A: Yes, especially in abstractio­n, because within that media, you can see references of Africanism and of the Black experience. At least I can. Look at the work of Mary Loveless O’Neal, Oliver Jackson, Dewey Crumpler, David Bradford, Raymond Holbert — you didn’t even know about Howardena Pindell until recently. Raymond Saunders, who I met when I was 18 years old. There are all these people who I came to know in school, some a few years my senior, and some are my age that I had around me.

Being introduced to Paul Robeson, hearing Marian Anderson, Leontyne Price. Duke Ellington performed two doors from my house. Josephine Baker. I have that experience, but everyone didn’t have that experience.

Q: How do you think the arts can become more equitable?

A: Once again, money talks, right? That’s the bottom line.

Q: Should there be a push for more state arts funding?

A: In some ways, yes.

You know what I’d like for you to do? Google “Abbey Lincoln ‘The World Is Falling Down.’ ” You know who is similar to that now? The young woman who read the poem at the inaugurati­on, Amanda Gorman. ... All people have to do is open their eyes. We have always been here, it’s nothing new. If art is about seeing, then open your eyes.

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 ?? Photos by Paul Kuroda / Special to The Chronicle ?? Above: Sculptor and assemblage artist Mildred Howard works on her “Untitled House” project, fusing glass vials in her studio in Oakland. Right: “Strings to the Heart” is also a work in progress in the studio.
Photos by Paul Kuroda / Special to The Chronicle Above: Sculptor and assemblage artist Mildred Howard works on her “Untitled House” project, fusing glass vials in her studio in Oakland. Right: “Strings to the Heart” is also a work in progress in the studio.
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