Feature Image

Decade of Tradition: Highlights from the Larry D. and Brenda A. Thompson Collection

Saturday, Jun 11, 2022 — Sunday, Jul 07, 2024


In 2012, Larry and Brenda Thompson gave 100 works of art by African American artists to the Georgia Museum of Art, mirroring the original donation of 100 American paintings by museum founder Alfred Heber Holbrook. In addition, they endowed a curatorial position to steward this collection to help fulfill the museum’s vision of an inclusive canon of American art. This exhibition includes works from the 2011 traveling exhibition “Tradition Redefined,” which preceded the gift, as well as subsequent works added in recent years that have not been on view in other galleries. These works celebrate the expansion of the museum’s permanent collection through this transformative gift of works by African American artists.

  • Georgia Museum of Art
    Moe Brooker (American, 1940 –⁠ 2022), “Toogaloo III,” 2003. Encaustic on paper, 20 × 15 inches. Georgia Museum of Art, University of Georgia; The Larry D. and Brenda A. Thompson Collection of African American Art. GMOA 2011.579.
    get_appDownload File
  • Georgia Museum of Art
    Joseph Delaney (American, 1904 – 1991), “Woman in Striped Dress,” 1964. Oil on board, 36 × 27 inches. Georgia Museum of Art, University of Georgia; The Larry D. and Brenda A. Thompson Collection of African American Art. GMOA 2011.585.
    get_appDownload File
  • Georgia Museum of Art
    Joyce Wellman (American, b. 1949), “Mutual 3,5,7,” 1999. Acrylic and collage on wood, 12 × 12 inches. Georgia Museum of Art, University of Georgia; The Larry D. and Brenda A. Thompson Collection of African American Art. GMOA 2011.606.
    get_appDownload File
  • Georgia Museum of Art
    Jack H. White (American, 1940 – 2017), “Dark Matters and Entropy #52,” 2006. Dry pigment, oxidized iron and copper-bronze plaster on Masonite, 18 × 24 inches. Georgia Museum of Art, University of Georgia; The Larry D. and Brenda A. Thompson Collection of African American Art. GMOA 2011.607.
    get_appDownload File
  • Georgia Museum of Art
    Louis Delsarte (American, 1944 – 2020), “The Gift,” 1999. Acrylic on canvas, 17 1/2 × 23 1/2 inches. Georgia Museum of Art, University of Georgia; The Larry D. and Brenda A. Thompson Collection of African American Art. GMOA 2012.120.
    get_appDownload File
  • Georgia Museum of Art
    David Clyde Driskell (American, 1931 – 2020), “Masks,” 1988. Tempera and encaustic on paper, 19 × 25 inches. Georgia Museum of Art, University of Georgia; The Larry D. and Brenda A. Thompson Collection of African American Art. GMOA 2012.121.
    get_appDownload File
Curator

Shawnya L. Harris, Larry D. and Brenda A. Thompson Curator of African American and African Diasporic Art

Sponsors

The W. Newton Morris Charitable Foundation and the Friends of the Georgia Museum of Art

Galleries

Boone and George-Ann Knox Gallery II