Open Air: A Conversation With Dexter Wimberly

For this special Black History Month Open Air, curator for the Gantt Center Dexter Wimberly speaks with photographer Earlie Hudnall, an artist featured in one of our current exhibits, Vision & Spirit | African American Art Works From The Bank Of America Collection.

This free virtual program will be streamed on the Gantt Center's official YouTube channel.

About Open Air

Open Air is a monthly series of virtual studio visits and intimate conversations with Black contemporary artists across the United States. Join us as we get a behind the scenes look at exciting new art as it's being created, while connecting particular works to some of the most pressing issues of our times. Historically, African-American artists have been compelled to make their own way within the art world, challenging traditional ideas of cultural representation and creating their own systems of merit, criticality and reward outside of the mainstream.

Earlie Hudnall was born and raised in Hattiesburg, Mississippi. His sense of community within his family and that of the African-American culture is what helped shape his work as an artist. Hudnall began photographing while serving as a Marine in the Vietnam War in the 1960’s. In 1968, he relocated to Houston to attend Texas Southern University and received his BA in Art Education. There he found the encouragement to continue photographing his subject matter of the everyday for African-Americans in the South. Hudnall made Houston his permanent home and has been working as the university photographer at Texas Southern University since 1990.

Hudnall is a board member for the Houston Center for Photography and an Executive Board member in the Texas Photographic Society. His work has been influential in the portrayal of the African-American community and culture. The cinematographer, James Laxton, of Academy Award winner for Best Picture in 2017, Moonlight, mentioned Hudnall as visual inspiration on how the film should depict African-Americans both aesthetically and symbolically.

His photographs are in many notable public and private collections across America, including the Smithsonian, Art Institute of Chicago and the Museum of Fine Arts in Houston.

Photo by Ray Carrington III

Dexter Wimberly is an independent curator and entrepreneur who has organized exhibitions and developed programs with galleries and institutions throughout the world including The Third Line in Dubai; Contemporary Art Museum CAM Raleigh in North Carolina; The Museum of the African Diaspora (MoAD) in San Francisco; Koki Arts in Tokyo; and the Museum of Arts and Design in New York City. His exhibitions have been reviewed and featured in publications including The New York Times, Artforum, and Hyperallergic; and have received support from The Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts. Wimberly has also served as Director of Strategic Planning at Independent Curators International in New York City.

Prior to his curatorial career, Wimberly was the managing partner and CEO of the advertising agency, August Bishop, representing a diverse array of clients, including Adidas, The Coca-Cola Company and, HBO. Wimberly is a Senior Critic at New York Academy of Art. He is also the founder of ART WORLD CONFERENCE, a business and financial literacy conference for visual artists. He and ART WORLD CONFERENCE co-organizer, Heather Bhandari were recently listed in the Observer's "Arts Power 50: Changemakers Shaping the Art World in 2019.”