Melvin Edwards

Melvin Edwards's 2015 conversation with Christopher Bedford and Chad Williams re-broadcasted by the Rose Art Museum for their series Encore Presentations.

This institutions press release follows:

The Rose Art Museum presents Encore Presentations, a new series that highlights the museum’s long history of engaging emerging and leading contemporary artists in critical conversations. This Encore Presentation features a discussion between artist Melvin Edwards, Christopher Bedford, Rose Director and Chief Curator (2012–2016), and Chad Williams, Professor and Chair of the Department of African American Studies at Brandeis University.

Celebrated for his distinctive sculptures and three-dimensional installations created from welded steel, barbed wire, chain, and machine parts, Melvin Edwards is considered a pioneer in the history of contemporary African-American art. Perhaps best known for his Lynch Fragments series, his work engages with the history of abstraction and themes of race, protest, and social injustice. This conversation, held in conjunction with the 2015 exhibition New Acquisitions, delved into Edwards’s artistic practice.

Two of the artist's Lynch Fragments, Nigerian Diamond (1978) and Loving Spiral (2005), are currently on view in the exhibition re: collections, Six Decades at the Rose Art Museum.

This Encore Presentation will be hosted online via Zoom. Registration is required.