Featured on PBS NewsHour: David Driskell exhibition curated by McGee

This article has been updated since its original publication on Jan. 11, 2021.

Julie McGee, professor of art history and Africana studies, guest curated a traveling exhibition that honors artist and historian David Driskell (1931-2020). Entitled David Driskell: Icons of Nature and History, the exhibition opened at the High Museum of Art, Atlanta, on Feb. 6. 

McGee spent years organizing the exhibition, selecting approximately 60 paintings and works on paper with dates ranging from 1953 to 2011. In an exhibition preview by ATLArt, Michael Rooks, Wieland Family Curator of Modern and Contemporary Art at the High, explained that Driskell  handpicked  McGee to curate the retrospective due to her extensive knowledge and research. In 2006, she published the culmination of her work in David C. Driskell: Artist and Scholar.

In September, McGee paid tribute to Driskell during the keynote address of the John Wilmerding Symposium on American Art 2020: A Tribute to David C. Driskell.

"What I find really compelling is Driskell's own artwork, individual works of art, they are not particularly narrative. In fact, they are iconic," McGee said. "They're symbolic representations that give us remembrances of things that he held dear."

The tour schedule for David Driskell: Icons of Nature and History is as follows:

• High Museum of Art, Atlanta | Feb. 6-May 9, 2021
• "Curatorial Conversation: Julie McGee and Michael Rooks" | Zoom | Feb. 18, 6 p.m.
• Portland Museum of Art | Portland, Maine | June 19-Sept. 12, 2021
• The Phillips Collection, Washington, D.C. | Oct. 6, 2021-Jan. 9, 2022