Thesis (M.A.)--Florida State University, 2003. / Advisor: Dr. John Corrigan, Florida State University, College of Arts and Sciences, Dept. of Religion. Title and description from dissertation home page (viewed 5/4/04). Includes bibliographical references.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Chicago, Department of Art History, June 2001. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 333-361). Also available on the Internet.

Thesis (Ed. D.)--Teachers College, Columbia University. / Typescript; issued also on microfilm. Sponsor: Justin Schorr. Dissertation Committee: William Mahoney. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 327-329).

Thesis (Ed.D.)--Teachers College, Columbia University. / Typescript; issued also on microfilm. Sponsor: Justin Schorr. Dissertation Committee: William C. Sayres. Bibliography: leaves 156-163.

Thesis (Ph.D.)--University of California, Los Angeles, 2002. / Vita. eContent provider-neutral record in process. Description based on print version record. Includes bibliographical references (p. 238-256).

Thesis (Ph.D.)--University of Delaware, 2009. / Principal faculty advisor: Ann E. Gibson, Dept. of Art History. Includes bibliographical references.

Thesis (M.A.)--University of Texas at El Paso, 2009. / Title from title screen. Vita. CD-ROM. Includes bibliographical references. Also available online.

No description available.

The goal of this study is to create a qualitative resource guide of African American culture, art, and artists for an art education curriculum. This project encompasses four main themes to reflect an area of African American culture via a work of art created by an African American artist. These themes are, Family with the sub themes African American Male, Matriarch, and Children; Spirit with the sub themes Faith, Spirituality, and Inspiration; Identity with the sub themes Artist’s Voice, Triumph, and Hope and Vision; Community with the sub themes Ancestors, Social Issues, and Cultural Voice. These themes constitute a basis depictive of the African American culture at a deeper level as resounded by ethicist Peter J. Paris’s reflection of the culture’s foundational building blocks, God, community, family, and person (Paris, 2004). This thesis looks beyond the composition, artistic essentials, historical relevance, and biographical sketches of the artists, to create an accessible and effective way to approach African American culture thematically. The resource provides connecting elements into a culture that has contributed to the very essence of the larger American culture.

This dissertation comparatively analyzes the architectural and visual histories of two black churches as examples of the material contribution of African Americans to the nation’s built environment. As cultural repositories, Metropolitan African Methodist Episcopal Church (AME) (1881-1886), Washington, D.C., and the Shrine of the Black Madonna #1, Pan African Orthodox Christian Church (1925/1957), Detroit, MI, are two sites that represent distinct forms of Black Nationalism. The history of Metropolitan AME uncovers aspects of late nineteenth century Classical Black Nationalism cultural practice. The Shrine of the Black Madonna #1 reflects the revisionist agenda of the Black Cultural Nationalist Movement of the 1960s and 1970s. The objective of this study is to expand through a cultural lens the growing body of scholarship that seeks to excavate under-recognized African-American visual and architectural traditions. This study contrasts different modes of claiming space for cultural affirmation: construction and real estate acquisition. Chapter one offers a rationale for the artifactual interrogation of African American churches and outlines the interdisciplinary methodologies employed in the case studies. In chapter two, Metropolitan A.M.E. Church’s architectural history presents an instance of an African American community using popular architectural and artistic styles in an associative manner to articulate racial advancement. Chapter three documents the aesthetic legacy of Metropolitan A.M.E. Church by considering the sanctuary’s stained glass window program, mural commissions executed by two rarely-discussed African American artists, donated art objects and the circulation of images of the religious site. Chapter four explores the Shrine of the Black Madonna #1’s 1957 purchase of a 1925 Colonial Revival ecclesiastical structure. This assessment contextualizes the lived interventions of a radical congregation to understand how shifts in material and visual patterns expressed cultural identity. Chapter five critically explores the aesthetic history of the Shrine of the Black Madonna #1 that begins with the Black Madonna and Child (1967) chancel mural by Glanton V. Dowdell. As the conclusion indicates, African American churches contain visible but hidden histories that expand African American art by introducing new iconographic considerations and revealing new art communities.