Acknowledgments

Finley, Cheryl

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Acknowledgments

Cheryl Finley

Committed to Memory: The Art of the Slave Ship Icon

~THE IDEA FOR THIS BOOK began in a graduate seminar at the Yale Center for British Art twenty years ago, when I came across an original engraving of the abolitionist print that is the subject of this study. Obsessed by the detail, history, and message of that eighteenth-century impression, it later became the focus of my dissertation, Committed to Memory: The...

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Cheryl Finley

PublisherPrinceton University Press

Stable URL: https://aaeportal.com/?id=-21697

Acknowledgments

THE IDEA FOR THIS BOOK began in a graduate seminar at the Yale Center for British Art twenty years ago, when I came across an original engraving of the abolitionist print that is the subject of this study. Obsessed by the detail, history, and message of that eighteenth-century impression, it later became the focus of my dissertation, Committed to Memory: The Slave Ship Icon in the Black Atlantic Imagination (2002). I was fortunate to have generous mentors at Yale, who encouraged me to take risks. Hazel V. Carby, Robert Farris Thompson, Paul Gilroy, Kellie Jones, and Laura Wexler guided this project at its earliest stages, providing essential support, feedback, and advice. In many ways, this study is indebted to the foundational work of Robert Farris Thompson and Paul Gilroy on the Black Atlantic; the innovative approaches to memory studies introduced to me by Hazel V. Carby, Laura Wexler, Dolores Hayden, and Joseph Roach; and the exemplary art historical training of Judith Wilson and Kellie Jones.

A project of this magnitude would not have been possible without the support of many institutions, libraries, and foundations. Postdoctoral fellowships from the Ford Foundation and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences provided the time, resources, and intellectual community at a pivotal moment as I was reimaging the dissertation for publication as a book. Dissertation research and writing was supported by the Center for Advanced Study in the Visual Arts, National Gallery of Art; the Ford Foundation; the Whitney Humanities Center; the Center for Advanced Study of Religion at Yale; the Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library; the British Art Center; the Center for the Study of Race, Inequality and Politics at Yale; the Pew Program in Religion and American History; the Paul Mellon Foundation; and the Gilder Lehrman Center for the Study of Slavery, Resistance and Abolition.

I am grateful for the many lunchtime meetings of the Sisters’ Seminar (Diana Magloni-Kerpel, Stephanie Sears, and Zoe Simone Baker) in whose patient presence many of the theoretical considerations of memory and identity were first identified for this study. Over time, other friends and working groups heard presentations, read drafts, and offered valuable feedback at crucial stages of the project’s development, including Deborah Willis, Julie Wolf, Alexandra Harris, and Mark Alexander Wright; the Photographic Memory Workshop at Yale, spearheaded by Laura Wexler, Leigh Raiford, and Robin Bernstein; the Mourning Group at Harvard, with Robin Bernstein, Vincent Brown, Glenda Carpio, and Barbara Rodriguez; and the Slavery in the Artistic, Literary and Historical Imagination working group at the Gilder Lehrman Center at Yale, chaired by Deborah McDowell and John Stauffer.

I am indebted to Cornell University for providing a supportive and innovative scholarly home that champions interdisciplinary work. In the History of Art Department, I cherish collaborating with friends and colleagues, who have offered generous resources, close readings, and instrumental feedback: Annetta Alexandridis, Ben Anderson, Judith Bernstock, Ananda Cohen-Aponte, Iftikhar Dadi, Maria Fernandez, Salah Hassan, Kaja McGowan, Claudia Lazarro, Laura Meixner, Andrew Moisey, An-Yi Pan, Lisa Pincus, Verity Platt, Jolene Rickard, Cynthia Robinson, and Shirley Samuels. My students never cease to impress me and indeed their work has enhanced this project, too. I am especially grateful to Amanda Gilvin and Hannah Ryan, who provided valuable research assistance in securing images. I also wish to acknowledge the many librarians at Cornell who championed this project: Eric Kofi Acree, Sharon Powers, Saah Nue Quigee Jr., Marsha Taichman, Katherine Reagan. I thank the talented photographic specialists Rhea Garen, Kark Fitzke, and Simon Ingall of DCAPS, who assisted with digitizing several images that appear in this book.

This book has grown from conversations with other friends across campus in long car rides to New York, over dinner, in coffee shops, and walking the gorgeous Gorges: Brett DeBary, Petrine Archer-Straw, Carole Boyce-Davies, Kate McCullough, Samantha Sheppard, Amy Villarejo, and Sabine Haenni. I wish to recognize the special contribution of Mary Pat Brady, who read early drafts of the manuscript and arranged for me to meet Hanne Winarsky, who brought it to Princeton University Press. Now in the able hands of the editorial team headed by Michelle Komie, I am finally ready to let it go out in the world. I couldn’t ask for a more patient, understanding, and forthright editor than Michelle Komie or a more professional and detailed production team than Sara Lerner, Steven Sears, and Hannah Zuckerman. Thank you for believing in my project and seeing it through to fruition after so many years.

I am humbled by the generosity of the artists and curators, who gave of their time to talk to me about their work, and whose wisdom and vision have contributed to this book in profound ways: Terry Adkins, Elizabeth Alexander, Amiri Baraka, Sanford Biggers, Maria Magdalena Campos-Pons, Willie Cole, Robert Croslin, Godfried Donkor, Dr. David C. Driskell, Mary Elliott, Mary Evans, Tom Feelings, Neville Garrick, Joy Gregory, Sunil Gupta, Reverend Marshall E. Hatch, Marshall E. Hatch Jr., Stephen Hayes, Romuald Hazoumé, Rita Keegan, Roshini Kempadoo, Eugene Lee, Horace Ove, Joe Overstreet, Keith Piper, Ingrid Pollard, Marianetta Porter, Betye Saar, Yinka Shonibare, Ike Udé, Nari Ward, Deborah Willis and Hank Willis Thomas. Your work is the art of the slave ship icon and much appreciation is owed to you for granting me permission to reproduce your work here. I also thank the archivists, studio managers, gallerists, and dealers who helped to provide images and permissions: Hank Willis Thomas Studio, Sanford Biggers Studio, Halley K. Harrisburg and Michael Rosenfeld, Jack Shainman Gallery, October Gallery, Alexander and Bonin, Swann Galleries, Rodney Moore, Zak Ove, Corrine Jennings, Kenkeleba Gallery, Romare Bearden Foundation, Diedre Harris Kelly, Dianne Johnson-Feelings, Patricia Willis, Nancy Kuhl, the de Menil Collection, Lehmann Maupin Gallery, and James Cohan Gallery.

I am grateful to the friends and family around the world who opened their homes to me during the research and writing phase of this project: William and Betsy Sledge, Diana Magaloni-Kerpel and Michael Layton, Zelda Cheatle, Michael Birt, Joy Gregory, Bea Freeman, the family of Kofi Blankson (Paa Kwesi Ocancy and Mother Rosamond Arkonful); Pascale Vallet, Dr. Helen Holte-DaCosta, Penelope Dixon and Michael Ball, Jessica Allison, Rachel Schlass, Kirsty Allore and Angus Beasely, and the Gear Family.

Finally, I thank my family for sustaining me throughout the past several years with patience, generosity, and understanding. The idea for this book took root at about the same time that the first of my nephews and nieces were born and they seemed to make its premise all the more relevant. When my daughter, Noura, was born, she began posing the difficult questions that only a child would know to ask and the book’s message became all the more urgent. I am ever in awe of her quick wit and kind soul. I thank my sister, Lisa, for her unwavering support of my endeavors; and my mother, Gail T. Finley, for always believing in me. I am proud to call Mark Alexander Wright my husband and I have the utmost respect and love for him and our children, Noah, Jacob, and Noura. I thank Mark and our children for believing in me and for their constant love, encouragement, and support.

Cheryl Finley
Ithaca, New York

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