James E. Lewis Museum of Art

One of BAIA Foundation’s 2022 initiatives is instituting marketing assistance for African American Museums and Cultural Centers. 

James E. Lewis was born in 1923 in Virginia to parents whose careers were limited to sharecropping. His father moved the family to Baltimore for what he’d hoped to be a better life. Lewis attended the only high school in the city that accepted Black students and was introduced to the arts by a faculty member there. By the time he was 19, he had created five portrait busts.

He continued creating throughout his college career then began collecting art as well. He joined Morgan State University, Maryland’s largest HBCU, founded two years after slavery was outlawed, to chair the art department. According to The Baltimore Sun, “Mr. Lewis encouraged everyone to collect sculptures and paintings. He wanted society to appreciate artists, especially African-American artists, whom he feared history would ignore.”

In 1951, James E. Lewis established the Gallery of Art at Morgan. His mission was to develop collections and curricula at Morgan State in an era where Black people had little to no access to the Fine Arts. By the time he retired in 1986, he had amassed one of the most comprehensive art collections on the East Coast. He’d buy his students’ work too. What better way to convince young people that, as we say here at BAIA, “art dreams do come true,” than by actually purchasing and sharing their work? In 1990, four years after Lewis’s retirement, the museum was renamed for him. 

The James E. Lewis Museum of Art (JELMA) is the cultural extension of Morgan State University’s Fine Arts academic program. Developed to enhance the scholastic experience of the University’s student population and the community’s exposure to works of art, JELMA provides opportunities to experience exhibitions, programs and lectures.

https://www.jelmamuseum.org/

JELMA also plans to develop art outreach programs to grade school students and provide a forum of local, undiscovered talent. Moreover, the Museum will expand the breadth of its presentations and its activities as a collection and lending agency, to service galleries on a worldwide scale. To facilitate the anticipated growth in its artistic and cultural offerings, the Museum will enhance and expand its gallery administration program.

Like Black Art in America, JELMA understands how important it is for everyone to have access to the Fine Arts. So they work with local and global communities to ensure that accessibility is present for students on campus but also for the entire Baltimore community, which is more than 60% Black. (They also now carry copies of BAIA, the Mag.) 

James E. Lewis, prominent Baltimore artist and longtime chairman of the art department at Morgan State University (Courtesy of Morgan State)

The JELMA collection includes all cultures, genres and media. Highlighting African American, Asian, European and Oceanic art, the work presented comprises abstraction, sculpture, photography, painting, collage, drawing and more. 

Current exhibitions include:

https://www.jelmamuseum.org/events

• Guest Artist: Mercy Moyo (featuring paintings from the JELMA collection and prints created by Zimbabwe artist Mercy Moyo during an artist’s residency in the U.S.)
• James E. Lewis Museum Permanent Collection (JELMA’s ongoing collection)

Upcoming exhibitions include: 

• Faculty Exhibition March 31 – April 24, 2022 (Works by Faculty in Morgan State University’s Fine Arts Department)
• Masters Thesis Exhibit March 31 – April 20, 2022 (Damien Taylor, Photographer, Masters Degree candidate in Museum Studies)
• Senior ExhibitionMay 3 – May 22, 2022 (Works by senior year students in Morgan State University’s Fine Arts Department)

Learn more and find out how you can support the James E. Lewis Museum of Art here.

THE BLACK ART IN AMERICA (BAIA) FOUNDATION is a 501c3 organization that applies what we’ve learned over our 12 years as a multifaceted arts company to facilitate the growth of artists while cultivating the relationships and opportunities that bring Black artists and communities together. 

We invite you to become a monthly supporter of the BAIA Foundation. Starting at just $3 a month, YOU become a stakeholder and begin to help us transform lives through art. We are growing the BAIA team and will use your contributions to hire more team members for the purpose of creating more educational and marketing resources for schools and universities about african american artists both past and present. Such art initiatives and educational programming like Blacklite with Steve Prince, Relating to Art with Dr. Kelli Morgan, and BAIA BITS would not be possible without the ongoing support of our Patreon members. Please consider becoming a monthly Patreon member today!

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