Black History Month 2024
Black History Month 2024
Join us as we take a step back in history and explore the lives of black artists through arts and literature.
This Black History Month, we are delighted to announce the acquisition of two pieces by British, Ghanaian and Vincentian artist Emma Prempeh.
Emma Prempeh’s practice delves into the concepts of distant memories. The starting point to her work is the matter of blackness – the tonal properties of the colour establishes the ground to her paintings and provides a cinematic basis to invoke memories of events, people, and places.
Her works explore questions of what it is like to feel in-between; where we decide what is our home and how this is explored or experienced by individuals across the African diasporic plane and those who cross and interweave within it.
Family and generational continuity is often the subject of Prempeh’s paintings, relational ties are explored through the depiction of her mother and grandma and their experiences. It’s the People That Make a Home presents a sense of warmth and features her grandma sharing photographs. The cat in the background is totemistic of Prempeh’s presence and a symbol of rest.
Prempeh sees her grandma’s home as a place of refuge and comfort with her home being an expression of her cultural identity. 1936 portrays the feet of Prempeh’s grandma emphasising Prempeh’s roots in the UK due to her grandma’s movement to Britain.
The Harris has relatively few works by women artists, particularly figurative paintings which explore experiences of identity, representations of diversity and intergenerational family life. It’s the People That Make a Home and 1936 are important additions to the collection, they will form part of a major redisplay when the Harris reopens in 2025. With particular focus on narratives that explore identity, heritage and a sense of belonging, The Harris has an ongoing commitment to working with local communities including Preston’s Windrush generation and descendants.
Presented by the Contemporary Art Society, 2023/2024. Courtesy of the Artist and Tiwani Contemporary. Photography by Deniz Guzel.
Books
Have you visited our library recently? We have a range of adult and children’s books ready for you to borrow, that explore the lives of black icons and characters, written by black authors. If you need a recommendation, ask one of our friendly librarians.
Blogs
Discover one of our latest acquisition ‘Sweetest Devotion’ and learn more about the artist behind the piece, Billie Zangewa.
Read about the life of designer Althea McNish and how she left her mark on the textiles world. You’ll also be able to see one of her wonderful prints in our collection which can be found on our Fashion & Textiles page.
Preston’s African Caribbean Community
Oral History
Listen to clips of an interview with Preston’s Maxine Grant recorded in 2002. These are part of a larger archive of oral histories that we will share more of on the collections page.
