“The abstraction, ostensibly, is simply for me a penetration of something that is more profound in many ways than the rigidity of form. A form if it breathes some, if it has some enigma to it, it is also the enigma that is the abstract. I would think.”[1]

An extraordinary colorist whose style transformed from figurative expressionism to lyrical abstraction, Beauford Delaney was born in Knoxville, Tennessee in 1901. He was the eighth of ten children his mother bore, but one of only a few who survived to adulthood. Beauford’s mother, Delia Johnson Delaney, had been born into slavery in 1865 and was a devout Christian who imparted her strict beliefs on her children. However, her strictness did not prevent her from recognizing and nurturing her young son’s artistic talent. Beauford’s father, John Samuel Delaney (known as Sam), was a Methodist Episcopal preacher who spent much of his time traveling and ministering to black communities in need of churches. From 1910 to 1915, the family lived in Jefferson City, where church and religion dominated their social and intellectual activities. Despite the painful losses that afflicted the Delaney family, Beauford’s recollection of his childhood in his “very close: passionate and dramatic” family was largely positive. However, in 1915, Delaney suffered a loss that stayed with him until his own death when his sister and best friend, Ogust Mae, died. Soon after, Sam was called back to Knoxville, and the family returned to their original home.[2]

When he was fifteen, Delaney received his first commission, from the shoemaker who employed him as an apprentice. He also met local artist Lloyd Branson, a white painter, who gave Delaney art lessons in exchange for his doing odd jobs around the studio. In 1919, Delaney’s father died suddenly. That same year, the relative tranquility of Knoxville erupted into race riots triggered when a white mob attempted to lynch Maurice Hays, a black man accused of killing a white woman. Hays—who maintained his innocence until his execution in 1921—had been sent out of town to await trial, but the violence between Knoxville’s black and white populations lasted for two more days.

These events haunted Delaney throughout his life. In 1923, he left Knoxville for Boston, where he studied art at the Massachusetts Normal School (later the Massachusetts College of Art), the Copley Society, and the South Boston School of Art. Delaney also spent considerable time at the Museum of Fine Arts and the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, where he became familiar with impressionist painting as well as the portraiture of John Singer Sargent. In 1929, Delaney moved to New York. In this city scarred by the Great Depression, Delaney “felt an affinity with the multitude of marginalized races and classes in the city and instantly connected with these disenfranchised communities.”[3] He found work in the dance studio of Billy Pierce and “began rendering portraits of the studio's dancers and its socialite clientele (although he rarely received compensation for his artwork).”[4] In 1930, the new Whitney Museum of American Art (at the time, a gallery in the West Village) mounted an exhibition of his portraits. Delaney received favorable reviews, and soon after, the New York Public Library’s 135^th Street Branch (now the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture) also gave him a solo show.[5] The following year, Delaney began his studies at the Art Students League, where he worked with John Sloan and Thomas Hart Benton, among others.

Delaney found work with the mural division of the Federal Art Project (under the aegis of the Works Progress Administration), and in 1935, he worked with artist Charles Alston on the Harlem Hospital mural project. During this time, Delaney frequented the salons and exhibitions held in Charles Alston’s studio, located at 306 West 141 Street. Known simply as “306,” this space served as a center for the most creative minds in Harlem, and regulars included Norman Lewis, Jacob Lawrence, Augusta Savage, Romare Bearden, Richard Wright, Robert Blackburn, Countee Cullen, Ralph Ellison, and Gwendolyn Knight. He was also a member of the Harlem Artists Guild. Despite his presence in Harlem’s cultural centers, Delaney was consumed by his own artistic vision, and he remained firmly connected to the Greenwich Village artistic community, forming close friendships with writers and artists such as Henry Miller, Alfred Stieglitz, Georgia O’Keefe, and Al Hirschfeld. This individuality left him somewhat vulnerable to obscurity in an art market that expected black artists to adhere to social realist portrayals of African American everyday life. The portraits, still-lives, street scenes, and modernist interiors Delaney created in the 1940s and 1950s used a thick impasto paint and featured undulating lines and bright colors reminiscent of fauvism. These vibrant, passionate works hovered between abstraction and the figurative, further confounding attempts to fit him into a marketable slot. Furthermore, although Delaney was accepted within New York’s elite of black and white artists and intellectuals, he continued to feel marginalized along the lines of race, class, and sexuality.

SELECTED MUSEUM COLLECTIONS

The Anacostia Museum, Washington, DC
Arizona African-American Museum, Phoeniz, AZ
Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago, IL
Baltimore Museum of Art, Baltimore, MD
Bowdoin College Museum of Art, Brunswick, ME
Brooklyn Museum of Art, Brooklyn, NY
Carnegie Museum of Art, Pittsburgh, PA
Centre Georges Pompidou, Paris, France
Chrysler Museum of Art, Norfolk, VA
Crocker Art Museum, Sacramento, CA
Delaware Art Museum, Wilmington, DE
Detroit Institute of Arts, Detroit, MI
Ewing Gallery of Art + Architecture, University of Tennessee, Knoxville, TN
Fisk University Galleries, Nashville, TN
Greenville County Museum of Art, Greenville, SC
Hampton University Museum, Hampton, VA
High Museum of Art, Atlanta, GA
Indiana University Art Museum, Bloomington, IN
James E. Lewis Museum, Morgan State University, Baltimore, MD
Memorial Art Gallery, Rochester, NY
The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, NY
The Minneapolis Institute of Arts, Minneapolis, MN
Morgan State University, Baltimore, MD
Musée Cantonal des Beaux Arts, Lausanne, Switzerland
Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, MA
National Portrait Gallery, Washington, DC
The Newark Museum, Newark, NJ
Palmer Museum of Art, Pennsylvania State University, University Park, PA
Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, Philadelphia, PA
Philadelphia Museum of Art, Philadelphia, PA
Rose Art Museum, Brandeis University, Waltham, MA
Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, New York, NY
Smithsonian American Art Museum, Washington, DC
The Studio Museum in Harlem, New York, NY
Tampa Museum of Art, Tampa, FL
Tennessee State Museum, Nashville, TN
University of Michigan Museum of Art, Ann Arbor, MI
Wadsworth Atheneum Museum of Art, Hartford, CT
Weatherspoon Art Gallery, University of North Carolina, Greensboro, NC
Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, NY
Worcester Art Museum, Worcester, MA

1930
Beauford Delaney, 135th Street Branch, New York Public Library, New York, NY
Beauford Delaney, Whitney Studio Galleries, New York, NY

1932   
Beauford Delaney, 42nd Street Library, New York, NY

1938   
Beauford Delaney, 8th Street Playhouse Art Gallery, New York, NY
Beauford Delaney, C Gallery, Washington, DC

1941   
Beauford Delaney, Vendome Gallery, New York, NY

1947
Annual Exhibition, Pyramid Club, Philadelphia, PA

1948
Delaney: An Exhibition of Paintings by Beauford Delaney, Artists Gallery, New York, NY

1949
Beauford Delaney, Roko Gallery, New York, NY; 1950, 51, 52, 53

1950   
Oil Paintings and Pastels by Beauford Delaney, University of Maine Art Gallery, Orono, ME

1955
Gallery Clan, Madrid, Spain

1956   
Beauford Delaney, Galerie Prisme, Paris, France

1960   
Beauford Delaney, Galerie Paul Facchetti, Paris, France; 1961, 73

1961  
Centre Culturel Américain, Paris, France

1964   
Beauford Delaney, Gallery Lambert, Paris, France

1967
James E. Lewis Museum, Morgan State College, Baltimore, MD
Beauford Delaney, Retrospective, Centre Culturel Américain, Paris, France

1973
Beauford Delaney, Galerie Darthea Speyer, Paris, France

1978
Beauford Delaney, A Retrospective, The Studio Museum in Harlem, New York, NY; The Philadelphia Art Alliance, Philadelphia, PA

1988   
From Tennessee to Paris, Philippe Briet Gallery, New York, NY

1991
A Retrospective: Fifty Years of Light, Philippe Briet Gallery, New York, NY

1992
Beauford Delaney, Galerie Darthea Speyer, Paris, France

1994
Beauford Delaney: The New York Years, Philippe Briet Gallery, New York, NY

1995  
Beauford Delaney: Paris Abstractions from 1960s, Michael Rosenfeld Gallery, New York, NY

1998
Beauford Delaney: An Introduction, Knoxville Museum of Art, Knoxville, TN

1999
Beauford Delaney: Liquid Light: Paris Abstractions, Michael Rosenfeld Gallery, New York, NY; Greenville County Museum of Art, Greenville, SC

2002
Beauford Delaney: The Color Yellow, High Museum of Art, Atlanta, GA; The Studio Museum in Harlem, New York, NY; The Anacostia Museum of the Smithsonian Institution, Washington, DC; Fogg Art Museum, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA

2004
Beauford Delaney from New York to Paris, The Minneapolis Institute of Arts, Minneapolis, MN; Knoxville Museum of Art, Knoxville, TN; Greenville County Museum, Greenville, SC; Philadelphia Museum of Art, Philadelphia, PA

2016
Resonance of Form and Vibration of Color, organized by Les Amis de Beauford Delaney and the Wells International Foundation, Columbia Global Centers | Paris at Reid Hall, Columbia University, Paris, France

2017
Gathering Light: Works by Beauford Delaney from the KMA Collection, Knoxville Museum of Art, Knoxville, TN

2020
Beauford Delaney and James Baldwin: Through the Unusual Door, Knoxville Museum of Art, Knoxville, TN

1930
Exhibition by Four Sunday Painters: Arthur E. Cederquist, Beauford Delaney, Prosper Invernizi,
Kalman Oswald, Whitney Studio Club (Whitney Museum of American Art), New York, NY

1931
Exhibition of the Productions by Negro Artists, The Harmon Foundation, New York, NY

1933
Cooperative Art Market and Roxy Theatre, New York, NY
The Harmon Foundation, New York, NY

1934
Independent Artists, New York, NY
Grand Central Palace, New York, NY
Washington Square Outdoor Exhibit, New York, NY; 1935, 36, 37, 38
Jumble Shop, New York, NY; 1935
Poet's Inn, New York, NY; 1935

1935
International Art Center, Roerich Museum, New York, NY
Negro Artists: An Illustrated Review of Their Achievements, The Harmon Foundation, New York, NY

1939
The C Gallery, Washington, DC
Contemporary Negro Art, Baltimore Museum of Art, Baltimore, MD
First Annual Exhibition, Salon of Contemporary Negro Art, New York, NY

1940
Exhibition of the Art of the American Negro (1851-1940), Tanner Art Galleries, Chicago, IL;
Library of Congress, Washington, DC

1941
McMillen Galleries, New York, NY
8th Street Cafeteria, New York, NY
American Negro Art: 19th and 20th Centuriet, Downtown Gallery, New York, NY

1944
Institute of Modern Art, Boston, MA
American Negro Art – Contemporary Painting and Sculpture, The Newark Museum, Newark, NJ
The Negro in Contemporary Art, Baltimore Museum of Art, Baltimore, MD

1945
Powell House, New York, NY

1947
Beauford Delaney and Ellis Wilson, Artists Gallery, New York, NY

1948
The Village Art Center, New York, NY

1949
Roko Gallery, New York, NY
The Village Art Center, New York, NY

1950
1950 Whitney Annual Exhibition: Sculpture, Paintings, Watercolors and Drawings, Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, NY

1951
Contemporary Americans, Roko Gallery, New York, NY
Washington Square Inn, New York, NY

1952
Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Art, Philadelphia, PA
University of Nebraska, Lincoln, NE

1954
Salon des Réalités Nouvelles, Musée d'Art Moderne, Paris, France; 1960, 63
Ninth Salon, Palais des Beaux Arts, Paris, France

1955
Les plus mauvais Tableaux, Nuagisme, Galerie Prisme, Paris, France

1956
Musée d’Art Moderne, Paris France
Musée Iserlohn, Germany
Abstract American, Galerie Arnaud, Paris, France; 1966
First Exposition of Negro Progress, Wanamaker Building, New York, NY

1957
Groupe de la Galerie Facchetti, Galerie Facchetti, Paris, France; Bordighera, Italy; University of Wisconsin, Madison, WI
Comparisons, Musée d'Art Moderne, Paris, France
L'insurrection Contre La Forme, Galerie Prisme, Paris, France

1958
Neues aus der neuen Malerei, Städtisches Museum, Leverkusen, Germany
Palais des Beaux-Arts, Charleroi, Belgium
Galerie Facchetti, Paris, France; 1960, 66

1959
Galerie Breteau, Paris, France; 1962
Musée des Beaux-Arts
Beauford Delaney and Charley Boggs, rue Marbeuf, Paris, France (sponsored by the Special Services Division of the US Army)
Galleria Numero, Florence, Italy

1960
Antagonismes, Musée des Arts Décoratifs, Paris, France
Twentieth Anniversary Exhibit, Roko Gallery, New York, NY
Musée Municipal d’Art Moderne, Paris France

1961
Lincoln Gallery, London, England
Beauford Delaney, Joe Downing, and Caroline Lee, Centre Culturel Américain, Paris, France
James Bishop, David Budd, Gaston Chaissac, Beauford Delaney, Manuel Duque, Sam Francis, Alain
Jacquet, and Pouget, Galerie Breteau, Paris, France
Das Naive Bild der Welt (Naive Pictures of the World), Baden-Baden, Staatliche Kunsthalle, Germany

1962
Carnegie International, Carnegie Institute, Pittsburgh, PA
Musée des Arts Décoratifs, Paris, France
Resurgence, Galerie Breteau, Paris, France
Centre Culturel Américain, Paris, France

1963
Musée Cantonal des Beaux-Arts, Lausanne, France
Musée Municipal d’Art Moderne, Paris France

1964
Le Nuage Crève, Galerie Internationale d’Art Contemporain, Paris, France
10 American Negro Artists, Den Frie, Oslo Plads, Copenhagen, Denmark
…Some Negro Artists, Art Gallery, Fairleigh Dickinson University, Madison, NJ

1965
La Boutique d’Ete, Galerie Lambert, Paris, France
Centre Cultural Americain, Paris, France

1966
Gallery A, Paris, France
Galerie Paul Facchetti

1967
L’Age du Jazz, Musée Galliera, Paris, France
Negro Art, City College, New York, NY
Peintures de Mai, Galerie Facchetti, Paris, France
The Evolution of Afro-American Artists: 1800-1950, Great Hall, City College, New York, NY
James E. Lewis Museum, Morgan State College, Baltimore, MD

1968
Black Artists in America: 19th and 20th Centuries, Wilcox Gallery, Swarthmore, College, Swarthmore, PA

1969
A Tribute to the Life of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., The Community Church Art Gallery, New York, NY

1970
Afro-American Artists Abroad, Jack S. Blanton Museum of Art, University of Texas, Austin, TX

1971
Black Artists: Two Generations, The Newark Museum, Newark, NJ

1972
Les Amis Parisiens de Henry Miller, Centre Culturel Américain, Paris, France

1976
Hommage a Julien Alvard, Chateau de Anzy-le-Franc, Paris, France

1978
New York/Chicago: WPA and the Black Artist, The Studio Museum in Harlem, New York, NY

1981
Le Clair et l’Obscur, Musée d’Evreux, Paris, France

1983
Selections, Salander O'Reilly Galleries, Inc., New York, NY
Color Expressions, James E. Lewis Museum, Morgan State University, Baltimore, MD

1984
Since the Harlem Renaissance: 50 Years of Afro-American Art, The Center Gallery (now Samek Art Museum), Bucknell University, Lewisburg, PA; The Amelie A. Wallace Gallery, College at Westbury (now SUNY Old Westbury), State University of New York, Old Westbury, NY; Munson-Williams-Proctor Institute Museum of Art, Munson-Williams-Proctor Institute, Utica, NY; University of Maryland Art Gallery, University of Maryland, College Park, MD; Chrysler Museum of Art, Norfolk, VA; Museum of Art (now Palmer Museum of Art), Pennsylvania State University, University Park, PA

1985
Hidden Heritage: African American Artists: 1800 – 1950, Bellevue Art Museum, Bellevue, WA

1987
Harlem Renaissance: Art of Black America, The Studio Museum in Harlem, New York, NY

1989
African-American Artists, 1880-1987, Selections from the Evans Tibbs Collection, Smithsonian
Institution Traveling Exhibition Services, Washington, DC
Don’t You Know Me By Now, Philippe Briet Gallery, New York, NY

1990
Against the Odds: African American Artists and the Harmon Foundation, The Newark Museum, Newark, NJ; Gibbes Museum of Art, Charleston, SC; Chicago Public Library Cultural Center, Chicago, IL

1991
Portrait de Jean Genet, FIAC, Galerie Darthea Speyer, Paris, France
The Search for Freedom: African American Abstract Painting 1945-1975, Kenkeleba Gallery, New York, NY
Domenikos Theotokopoulos: A Dialogue, Phillippe Briet Gallery, New York, NY
The Walter O. Evans Collection of African American Art, The Beach Institute African-American Cultural Center / King-Tisdell Cottage, Savannah, GA; Hammonds House Galleries and Resource Center (now Hammonds House Museum), Atlanta, GA; Museum of Fine Arts, St. Petersburg, FL; Boston University Art Galleries, Boston University, Boston, MA; Main Gallery, Arts Consortium of Cincinnati, Cincinnati, OH; UTSA Institute of Texan Cultures, University of Texas at San Antonio (UTSA), San Antonio, TX; Canton Art Institute (now Canton Museum of Art), Canton, OH; Delaware Art Museum, Wilmington, DE; University of Hawai‘i at Mānoa Art Gallery, University of Hawai‘i at Mānoa, Honolulu, HI; Flint Institute of Arts, Flint, MI; Kalamazoo Institute of Arts, Kalamazoo, MI; Asheville Art Museum, Asheville, NC; Montgomery Museum of Fine Arts, Montgomery, AL; Senator John Heinz Pittsburgh Regional History Center, Pittsburgh, PA; Cheekwood Museum of Art, Cheekwood Estate & Gardens, Nashville, TN; Huntington Museum of Art, Huntington, WV; Walter Anderson Museum of Art, Ocean Springs, MS; Meadows Museum of Art at Centenary College of Louisiana, Shreveport, LA; Columbia Museum of Art, Columbia, SC; The Museum of Art/Tallahassee, Tallahassee, FL; Museum of Arts and Sciences, Macon, GA; Henry Ford Museum (now The Henry Ford), Dearborn, MI; Gibbes Museum of Art, Charleston, SC; Spelman College Museum of Fine Art, Spelman College, Atlanta, GA; Tyler Museum of Art, Tyler, TX; Morris Museum of Art, Augusta, GA; Fort Wayne Museum of Art, Fort Wayne, IN; Memorial Art Gallery, University of Rochester, Rochester, NY; Huntsville Museum of Art, Huntsville, AL; Mississippi Museum of Art, Jackson, MS

1992
Free Within Ourselves: African-American Artists in the Collection of the National Museum of American
Art, Wadsworth Atheneum Museum of Art, Hartford, CT; IBM Gallery of Science and Art, New York, NY; Crocker Art Museum, Sacramento, CA; Memphis Brooks Museum of Art, Memphis, TN; Columbus Museum, Columbus, GA
Selections from the Permanent Collection, Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago, IL
Paris Connections: African American Artists in Paris, Bomani Gallery and Jernigan Wicker Fine Art, San Francisco, CA

1993
Summer Group, Philippe Briet Gallery, New York, NY
Then and Now: African-American Artists, Sack Fine Arts, New York, NY
The 25th Anniversary Exhibition: Recent Acquisitions and Selected Works, The Studio Museum in Harlem, New York, NY

1994
African-American Art: 20th Century Masterworks, Michael Rosenfeld Gallery, New York, NY
African American Art: Harmon and Harriet Kelley Collection, San Antonio Museum of Art, San Antonio, TX; Michael C. Carlos Museum, Emory University, Atlanta, GA; Butler Institute of American Art, Youngstown, OH; Hunter Museum of Art, Chattanooga, TN
Empowerment: The Art of African American Artists, Krasdale Gallery, White Plains, NY
On Paper: Abstraction in American Art, Michael Rosenfeld Gallery, New York, NY
Selections from the Permanent Collection, Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago, IL
African-American Artists, 1920-1970, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, MA
Norman Lewis and His Contemporaries, G.R. N’Namdi Gallery, Birmingham, MI

1995
African-American Art: 20th Century Masterworks, II, Michael Rosenfeld Gallery, New York, NY; Long Beach Museum of Art, Long Beach, CA
Selections from the Permanent Collection, Delaware Art Museum, Wilmington, DE

1996 
African-American Art: 20th Century Masterworks III, Michael Rosenfeld Gallery, New York, NY
City of Ambition: Artists & New York, 1900-1960, Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, NY
Explorations in the City of Light: African-American Artists in Paris, 1945-65, The Studio Museum in
Harlem, New York, NY; Chicago Cultural Center, Chicago, IL; New Orleans Museum of Art, New Orleans, LA; The Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth, Fort Worth, TX; Milwaukee Art Museum, Milwaukee, WI
Selections from the Permanent Collection, Minneapolis Institute of Arts, Minneapolis, MN
Selections from the Permanent Collection, Greenville County Museum of Art, Greenville, SC; 1997-99

1997 
African-American Art: 20th Century Masterworks, IV, Michael Rosenfeld Gallery, New York, NY; Fisk University Galleries, Nashville, TN
Facets of the Figure: A Spectrum of 20th Century American Art, Michael Rosenfeld Gallery, New York, NY
Revisiting American Art: Works from the Collections of Historically Black Colleges and Universities, Katonah Museum of Art, Katonah, NY
Southern Collection Highlights, Greenville County Museum of Art, Greenville, SC
Soul and Spirit: 200 Years of African-American Art, Renaissance Gallery, Hampton University Museum, Hampton, VA
Visions of My People: African-American Art in Tennessee, Tennessee State Museum, Nashville, TN
Singular Impressions: The Monotype in America, National Museum of American Art, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, DC

1998
African-American Art: 20th Century Masterworks, V, Michael Rosenfeld Gallery, New York, NY; The Newcomb Art Gallery, Tulane University, New Orleans, LA
African-American Artists from the Permanent Collection, Greenville County Museum of Art, Greenville, SC
Black New York Artists of the 20th Century, Selections from the Schomburg Center Collections, The New York Public Library, New York, NY
Tradition & Conflict: A Visual History of African-Americans in Art 19th and 20th Centuries, Ledbetter Lusk Gallery, Memphis, TN
Selections from the Permanent Collection, Worcester Art Museum, Worcester, MA
Galerie Darthea Speyer, Paris, France

1999
African-American Art: 20th Century Masterworks, VI, Michael Rosenfeld Gallery, New York, NY; Flint Institute of Arts, Flint, MI

2000
Michael Rosenfeld Gallery: The First Decade, Michael Rosenfeld Gallery, New York, NY
African-American Art: 20th Century Masterworks, VII, Michael Rosenfeld Gallery, New York, NY; Appleton Museum of Art, Ocala, FL
A Brush with the Past, G.R. N’Namdi Gallery, Birmingham, MI

2001
1950 – 1965: Abstraction on Paper, Michael Rosenfeld Gallery, New York, NY
An Artistic Friendship: Beauford Delaney and Lawrence Calcagno, Palmer Museum of Art, Pennsylvania State University, University Park, PA; Hampton University Art Museum, Hampton, VA; Vanderbilt University Fine Arts Gallery, Nashville, TN; Farnsworth Art Museum, Rockland, ME; The Arkansas Arts Center, Little Rock, AK; Musée d’Art Americain, Giverny, Giverny, France
African-American Art: 20th Century Masterworks, VIII, Michael Rosenfeld Gallery, New York, NY; Texas Southern University Museum, Houston, TX
Abstract Expressionism-Expanding the Canon, Gary Snyder Fine Art, New York, NY
Monet and Modernism, Kunsthalle der Hypo-Kulturstiftung, Munich, Germany
Out of the Fifties - Into the Sixties: Six Figurative Expressionists, Michael Rosenfeld Gallery, New York, NY

2002
African-American Art: 20th Century Masterworks, IX, Michael Rosenfeld Gallery, New York, NY
No Greater Love: Abstraction, Jack Tilton/Anna Kustera Gallery, New York, NY

2003
African-American Art: 20th Century Masterworks, X, Michael Rosenfeld Gallery, New York, NY
African American Masters: Highlights of the Smithsonian American Art Museum, New York Historical
Society, New York, NY; Cheekwood Museum of Art, Nashville, TN; The Cummer Museum of Art, Jacksonville, FL; Cincinnati Art Museum, Cincinnati, OH; Currier Museum of Art, Manchester, NH; The Delaware Art Museum, Wilmington, DE; Long Beach Museum of Art, Long Beach, CA; Utah Museum of Fine Arts, Salt Lake City, UT
Challenge of the Modern: African-American Artists 1925-1945, The Studio Museum in Harlem, New York, NY
Modernism: A Century of Style & Design, Seventh Regiment Armory, New York, NY
An American Legacy: Art from the Studio Museum in Harlem, Parrish Art Museum, Southampton, NY

2004
Embracing the Muse: Africa and African American Art, Michael Rosenfeld Gallery, New York, NY
Mood Indigo: The Legacy of Duke Ellington - A Look at Jazz and Improvisation in American Art, Michael Rosenfeld Gallery, New York, NY

2005
Syncopated Rhythms: 20th-Century African American Art from the George and Joyce Wein Collection, Boston University Art Gallery, Boston University, Boston, MA
Stroke! Beauford Delaney, Norman Lewis & Alma Thomas, Michael Rosenfeld Gallery, New York, NY
Another View: New York School, Opalka Gallery, The Sage Colleges, Albany, NY
Eye Contact: Painting and Drawing in American Art, Michael Rosenfeld Gallery, New York, NY

2006
American Modernism on Paper, Michael Rosenfeld Gallery, LLC, New York, NY

2007
Decoding Myth:  African American Abstraction, 1945-1975, Michael Rosenfeld Gallery, LLC, New York, NY
Body Beware: 16 American Artists, Michael Rosenfeld Gallery, LLC, New York, NY
Americans in Paris: Abstract Painting in the Fifties, Tibor de Nagy Gallery, New York, NY

2008
African American Art:  200 Years, Michael Rosenfeld Gallery, LLC, New York, NY
Circa 1958:  Breaking Ground in American Art, Ackland Art Museum, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, NC
Beyond the Canon: Small-Scale American Abstraction, 1945-1965, Robert Miller Gallery, New York, NY

2009
Larry and Brenda Thompson Collection, David C. Driskell Center, University of Maryland, College Park, MD
Abstract Expressionism: Further Evidence (Part One: Painting), Michael Rosenfeld Gallery, LLC, New York, NY

2011
Evolution in Action, Michael Rosenfeld Gallery LLC, New York, NY
Abstract Expressionism: Reloading the Canon, A Selection of Paintings and Sculpture, Michael Rosenfeld Gallery LLC, New York, NY

2012
African American Art in the Twentieth Century, Smithsonian American Art Museum, Washington, DC
Blues for Smoke, The Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles, CA; Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, NY; Wexner Center for the Arts, The Ohio State University, Columbus, OH
INsite/INchelsea: The Inaugural Exhibition, Michael Rosenfeld Gallery LLC, New York, NY
…On Paper, Michael Rosenfeld Gallery LLC, New York, NY

2013
Abstract Expressionism / In Context: Seymour Lipton, Michael Rosenfeld Gallery LLC, New York, NY

2014
Face Value: Portraiture in the Age of Abstraction, National Portrait Gallery, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, DC
Making Connections: The Art and Life of Herbert Gentry, Boston University Art Gallery, Boston, MA
Beyond the Spectrum: Abstraction in African American Art, 1950-1975, Michael Rosenfeld Gallery LLC, New York, NY
RISING UP/UPRISING: Twentieth Century African American Art, Michael Rosenfeld Gallery LLC, New York, NY
Conversations: African and African American Artworks in Dialogue from the Collections of the Smithsonian National Museum of African Art and Camille O. and William H. Cosby Jr., Smithsonian National Museum of African Art, Washington, DC

2015
Glenn Ligon: Encounters and Collisions, Nottingham Contemporary, Nottingham, England
Represent: 200 Years of African American Art in the Philadelphia Museum of Art, Philadelphia, PA
In Profile: Portraits from the Permanent Collection, The Studio Museum in Harlem, New York, NY
Night Visions: Nocturnes in American Art, 1860-1960, Bowdoin College Museum of Art, Brunswick, ME
I Got Rhythm: Art and Jazz since 1920, Stiftung Kunstmuseum Stuttgart, Stuttgart, Germany
Collectors Legacy: Selections from the Sandra Lloyd Baccus Collection, The David C. Driskell Center at the University of Maryland, College Park, MD

2016
Circa 1970, The Studio Museum in Harlem, New York, NY
Postwar: Art Between the Pacific and the Atlantic, 1945-1965, Haus Der Kunst, Munich, Germany; Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen, Rotterdam, The Netherlands
Gay Gotham: Art and Underground Culture in New York, Museum of the City of New York, New York, NY

2017
20/20: The Studio Museum in Harlem and Carnegie Museum of Art, Carnegie Museum of Art, Carnegie Institute, Pittsburgh, PA
Expanding Tradition: Selections from the Larry D. and Brenda A. Thompson Collection, Georgia Museum of Art, Athens, GA
Artists in Exile: Expressions of Loss and Hope, Yale University Art Gallery, New Haven, CT
Figuratively Speaking, Michael Rosenfeld Gallery LLC, New York, NY

2018
I Too Sing America: The Harlem Renaissance at 100, Columbus Museum of Art, Columbus, OH
Hopes Springing High: Gifts of Art by African American Artists, Crocker Art Museum, Sacramento, CA
Something to Say: The McNay Presents 100 Years of African American Art, McNay Art Museum, San Antonio, TX
Histórias Afro-Atlânticas, Museu de Arte de São Paulo (MASP) and Instituto Tomie Ohtake, São Paulo, Brazil
Talisman in the Age of Difference, Stephen Friedman Gallery, London, England
Celebrating 50 Years of the US Open Championships, United States Tennis Association (USTA) President’s Suite, Arthur Ashe Stadium, Flushing Meadows, NY
Lost, Loose, and Loved: Foreign Artists in Paris,1944-1968, Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía, Madrid, Spain

2019
Black Refractions: Highlights from The Studio Museum in Harlem, Museum of the African Diaspora, San Francisco, CA; Gibbes Museum of Art, Charleston, SC; Kalamazoo Institute of Arts, Kalamazoo, MI; Smith College Museum of Art, Smith College, Northampton, MA; Frye Art Museum, Seattle, WA; Utah Museum of Fine Arts, University of Utah, Salt Lake City, UT
God Made My Face: A Collective Portrait of James Baldwin, David Zwirner Gallery, New York, NY
Detroit Collects: Selections of African American Art from Private Collections, Detroit Institute of Arts, Detroit, MI
The Power of Our Own Spirit: Mental Health and Artists of the American South, TJC Gallery, The Johnson Collection, Spartanburg, SC
One Life: Marian Anderson, National Portrait Gallery, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, DC

2020
Riffs and Relations: African American Artists and the European Modernist Tradition, curated by Adrienne L. Childs, The Phillips Collection, Washington, DC