AfriCOBRA

Founded in 1968, the five founding artists of AfriCOBRA sought to gain an understanding of modern, transnational black aesthetics, so they could develop an artistic style that could be immediately identified as "Black Art." The group had its genesis in the dissolution of a prior collective called the Organization of Black American Culture (OBAC), which was itself formed as a tool for using art to address social and cultural challenges affecting the African American community. OBAC gained national prominence in 1967 when it organized a group of nine artists and nine photographers to collaborate on the creation of The Wall of Respect, a monumental mural painted on the side of a business in the Bronzeville neighborhood of Chicago. According to its creators, the mural "depicted 'Black Heroes' as positive role models for identity, community formation, and revolutionary action."

Following the completion of the Wall of Respect, some of the artists involved with the project began having casual get-togethers to discuss aesthetics and contemporary black culture. Those early meetings included Jeff Donaldson, Wadsworth Jarrell, Jae Jarrell, Barbara Jones-Hogu and Gerald Williams. Also sometimes present was Robert Paige, in whose home some of the gatherings took place. Over time, other artists, Nelson Stevens, Napoleon Jones-Henderson, Carolyn Lawrence, Frank Smith, and James Phillips-joined the group.

The aesthetic position that grew out of these meetings is defined by the use of text, positive figurative images of black people, abstract patterns evoking African artistic traditions, and bright, luminescent "Kool-Aid colors."

To help disseminate their ideas, the group published a manifesto in 1969, titled "Ten in Search of a Nation," which outlined three goals they hoped their work would achieve:

1.   definition-images that deal with the past
2.   identification-images that relate to the present
3.   direction-images that look into the future

Each AfriCOBRA artist then translated these ideas into physical form, and the group exhibited the work in a series of exhibitions that traveled the United States. The work spanned multiple mediums, including drawing, painting, sculpture, and fashion; the exhibitions attracted nationwide attention. By the time ArfiCOBRA I reached the Studio Museum in Harlem in the early 1970s, the group's aesthetic language had caught on like wildfire. During these early exhibitions, AfriCOBRA members noted that many viewers were unable to afford the art. In response, they made posters of their most popular paintings, reiterating their belief that art has to relate to everyday people if it is going to be effective as an impetus for social transformation.

Although AfriCOBRA ceased exhibiting together in the 1970s, most members continued in their art careers. Some have since passed away, but many are still active in their studios today.

Select exhbitions of AfriCOBRA's include, Mapping Resistance: The Legacy of Black Liberation (1925-1975); Kavi Gupta , Chicago, IL, 2025, I am Somebody, The Peninusla, Chicago, IL, 2022; The Met Breuer, NY, USA; AFRICOBRA: Nation Time, 2019 Venice Biennale Official Collateral Event, Venice, IT; AFRICOBRA: Messages to the People, MOCA North Miami, FL, USA; AFRICOBRA 50, Kavi Gupta, Chicago, USA; Soul of a Nation: Art in the Age of Black Power, Tate Modern, London, England; Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art, Fayetteville, AR; USA, Brooklyn Museum, NY, USA; The Broad Museum, Los Angeles, CA, USA; San Francisco MOMA, CA, USA, Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, TX, USA; Gerald Williams, Kavi Gupta, Chicago, USA; The Time is Now! Art Worlds of Chicago’s South Side, 1960-1980, Smart Museum of Art, Chicago, USA. A major profile of Williams appeared in Hyperallergic in 2018, based on an oral history included in the Smithsonian Archives of American Art.