Curators’ Perspectives: Kindred Spirits

Julie L. McGee is an art historian and independent curator. She developed David Driskell: Icons of Nature and History (2021), a critical survey of the artist’s practice, in collaboration with the High Museum of Art and the Portland Museum of Art. McGee’s current research projects include the American Dutch artist Sam Middleton and HBCUs and Curatorial Care: Critical Art Histories & David C. Driskell. The latter centers on Driskell’s years at Talladega College in Alabama, Howard University in Washington, D.C., and decade at Fisk University in Nashville, Tennessee. These years presage his best-known curatorial accomplishment, Two Centuries of Black American Art, which opened at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art in 1976. Centering Historically Black Colleges and Universities in American art and art history, the capaciousness of Two Centuries is read back in Driskell time, as it were. McGee is a 2024-2025 Tyson Scholar of American Art under the auspices of the Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art in Bentonville, Arkansas. Among McGee’s past fellowships are the Dorothy Kayser Hohenberg Chair of Excellence in Art History at the University of Memphis, a Paul Mellon Visiting Senior Fellowship at the Center for Advanced Study in the Visual Arts at the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C., and a Rockefeller Foundation Humanities Fellowship at the Smithsonian. Most recently, McGee served as the Director of the Interdisciplinary Humanities Research Center and Associate Professor of Africana Studies and Art History at the University of Delaware.

Jamaal B. Sheats, MFA, is the director and curator of the Fisk University Galleries and an assistant professor in the Fisk University Art Department. An alumni of Fisk, both positions enable Sheats to work with students, faculty, and the community in ways that integrate his expertise and passion for the arts, education, and mentorship. As a member of the Art Department, has taught Sculpture, Arts and Ideas, Drawing, and Independent Study courses for students with an interest in subspecialties. As the director and curator of Fisk University Galleries, he has successfully integrated the arts into all academic disciplines and increased engagement with the Middle Tennessee community through novel and innovative approaches.