Art review: Contemporary and ’60s-era social activism focus of ‘1960Now’

Bottom line: A talented photographer strives to unite the civil rights activism of the 1960s and the Black Lives Matter movement of our contemporary age, with a mix of earnestness and awkwardness.

"1960Now" is an exhibition that strives to find common ground between the civil rights activism of the 1960s and the Black Lives Matter movement of our current age. Atlanta-based artist Sheila Pree Bright offers her solo show at the Museum of Contemporary Art of Georgia as a plea for connection between generations with a shared mission: to end racial discrimination.

Pree Bright is an artist noted for her striking photographs offering often subtle, incisive commentary on race. In the past, she has mashed up images of young African-American girls and Barbie dolls to comment upon the impossible beauty standards that confront young women in her “Plastic Bodies” series. In her “Suburbia” photographs featuring the interiors of African-American homes, Pree Bright challenges the perception of those zones of American prosperity as lily white, by documenting the homes of well-heeled African-Americans.

“1960Now” is a continuation of Pree Bright’s interest in portraiture and in documenting black life. The show’s most arresting, affecting works are the 30 (36-by-36-inch) black-and-white prints with which Pree Bright papers the perimeter of the gallery, laying them on the floor to create a path of sorts, to change. The dramatic tight close-ups feature both old and young activists in past and present social activist movements, from a beatific portrait of the chairman of the Atlanta Student Movement 1961-1962, Charles A. Black, to one of Bree Newsome, who removed the Confederate flag from the South Carolina Capitol. The photographs feature both artists and more traditional activists, sending the message that culture can be a powerful agent of social progress.

But in many ways, “1960Now” feels most like a continuation of Pree Bright’s “Young Americans” project in which the photographer had ethnically diverse millennials ages 18-25 drape themselves in the American flag in portraits that revealed their often complicated sense of what it means to be an American.

At its heart, “1960Now” is a celebration of social activism directed toward a millennial audience (the #1960Now hashtag makes social media a central part of the show) and an effort at education. As an illustration of that educational interest in bridging the activism of the past and present, there are blackboards throughout the show with chalk supplied so gallery visitors can share their thoughts, which range from the thoughtful to the trite.

Two of the blackboards feature video collages of contemporary police violence protests in Baltimore, Washington, D.C., and Ferguson, Mo., juxtaposed with interviews with writer James Baldwin and singer Nina Simone, talking about matters of race and artistic responsibility.

At its heart, “1960Now” moves in often contradictory directions and can feel both vital and surprisingly inert.

On the one hand, there is a didactic and not necessarily illuminating dimension to some of what Pree Bright presents here. The blackboard as a teaching tool verges on the cliche, and the solicitation of audience participation does not generally yield revelatory results.

But “1960Now” is also a relevant, engaging treatment of racial divisions and issues of police violence in an age when those matters are all too common. Social issues are not often treated by Atlanta artists, and it is refreshing to see someone engaging with topical issues of race and injustice in a museum setting. Pree Bright’s nod to the past is also a welcome wake-up call to a younger generation. The implied message of “1960Now” is that long before today’s protest movement, parents and grandparents were laying the groundwork, and in the trenches fighting for social justice.