Vernissage for Hidden Blackness: Edward Mitchell Bannister (1828-1901)
Join us at the Owens Art Gallery for the opening vernissage of the new exhibition Hidden Blackness: Edward Mitchell Bannister (1828-1901).
On view: 25 January 2025 – 6 April 2025
Vernissage: Friday 24 January @ 7:00 pm
Curated by Dr. David Woods
Organized and circulated by the Owens Art Gallery, Mount Allison University, and the Black Artists Network of Nova Scotia (BANNS)
About the Exhibition
Hidden Blackness is the first major exhibition of Edward Mitchell Bannister’s work ever presented in Canada.
Born in Saint Andrews, NB, Bannister was a self-taught, nineteenth-century, African American/Canadian painter of the Barbizon school known for pastoral landscapes and seascapes. In 1876, Bannister won the bronze medal (first place) at the Centennial Exposition Art Exhibition in Philadelphia, making him the first artist of African descent and the first Canadian to win a major art prize in North America.
Bannister was also a prominent abolitionist and philanthropist (along with his wife Christiana Carteaux Bannister), and a respected art critic and co-founder the Providence Art Club, one of the oldest art societies in the United States.
Detailed venue access information
Top Image: Edward Mitchell Bannister, Approaching Storm, 1886, oil on canvas, 102.0 x 152.4 cm, Collection of the Smithsonian American Art Museum, Gift of G. William Miller (1983.95.62)
