The Chemistry of Color: The Sorgenti Collection of Contemporary African-American Art
is organized by the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts.

The Chemistry of Color titles a bold and vibrant collection of paintings from the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts. 71 works by African - American artists from a key period in American art — the 1970s through the 90s― show artists in the forefront of changes that began a decade before with the Civil Rights Movement.

Among the 41 artists in The Chemistry of Color who found inspiration in a poem, a photograph, texture, a pattern, or an object are Benny Andrews, Sam Gilliam, Edward Hughes, Alvin Loving, Howardena Pindell, Faith Ringgold, Betye Saar, and Raymond Saunders. Their works show their experimentation with color, narrative, and materials, and traced their expression of new American ideals forged in the last few decades of the 20th century. In the process, these African-American artists emerged from decades of invisibility in the art world.

Diverse in medium and style, the Chemistry of Color highlights sculpture, works on paper, and mixed media that are part of the Harold A. and Ann R. Sorgenti Collection of Contemporary African-American Art at the Pennsylvania Academy.  Formed at the ARCO Chemical Company when Mr. Sorgenti was its president, he purchased this important collection for the Academy, and in so doing secured it for the public.

I have always tried to paint the way poets write their best poems ― with feeling, imagination, and some semblance of the shape-shifting truth. - Edward Hughes

Selected Works

The Chemistry of Color

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