Confederate
Currency: The Color of Money investigates the importance of
slavery in the economy of the South. Artist John W. Jones has
researched and documented over 126 images of slavery that were
depicted on Confederate and Southern States money. The juxtaposition
of the framed Confederate Currencies with the acrylic paintings
inspired by the slave images on the currencies makes a very powerful
statement on the contribution of enslaved Africans to the American
economy. In these paintings, as John says, history informs art,
which in turn artfully reveals more history.
After
a very successful and extended showing at the Avery Research Center
Museum at the College of Charleston in Charleston (South Carolina),
the work is now available as a traveling exhibition. The
exhibition has been featured in several publications, including Time
Magazine, The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, The Chicago
Tribune, San Francisco Chronicle, The Atlanta Journal Constitution,
The Miami Herald, The Boston Globe and Cable News
Network (CNN). The exhibition, which broke attendance records at the
Avery Museum, has been well received by both black and white museumgoers. People are intrigued and enchanted. Over 95 percent of
those attending said that they never knew there were images of African
Americans on any American money. Its not something found in any
history books.
The
artist made the discovery when he worked in a print shop seven years
ago and a customer asked for an enlargement of one of his Confederate
bills. After making the enlargement, a shocked Jones found himself
looking at a picture of slaves picking cotton.
The paintings followed. As he explains,
I am partial to
the narrative content of art. I like to use my art to tell a story. In
this collection, the paintings innocuously draw you in and free you up
to confront the difficult subject of slavery without the fear of
censorship.
Confederate
Currency: The Color of Money was organized by the Avery Research
Center for African American History and Culture at the College of
Charleston. Booking and traveling arrangements are handled by
Exhibitions Plus, Incorporated.
Educational
and Programming materials include, an
exhibition catalog with scholarly essays by Dr. Richard Doty of the
Smithsonian Museum of American History, Dr. Wilmot Fraser, and a
comprehensive Teacher and Docent Guide prepared by Gretchen Barbatisis,
PhD, Professor of Telecommunication at Michigan State University.
Confederate
Currency: The Color of Money has been used as a medium to engender
educational and scholarly discussion. In addition to its value as an
art exhibit, it is a poignant, provocative and compelling centerpiece
for engaging such issues as slavery, reparations, racial profiling,
racial healing, institutional racism and discrimination. Institutions
scheduling the exhibition have incorporated it with symposiums,
conferences and lectures and have extended it to children and youth
through school and community education projects.
Contents:
40 original acrylic on
canvas paintings
24 each 26 X 30 paintings
20 each 24 X 30 paintings
2 each 21 X 36 paintings
3 each 30 X 36 paintings
1 each 30 X 42 painting
42 framed copies of
Confederate and Southern States currency (12 X 16 each)
