An Incomplete History of Protest: Selections from the Whitney’s Collection, 1940–2017

Aug 18, 2017–Aug 27, 2018

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In the 1990s, artists witnessed the persistence of racialized violence in American society and responded with newfound urgency. Two groundbreaking and controversial exhibitions at the Whitney, the 1993 Biennial and Black Male: Representations of Masculinity in Contemporary American Art (1994), tackled this issue directly. The Museum acquired works by Mel Chin and Carl Pope after they were shown in Black Male. Purposefully confrontational, the artists and their artworks speak unapologetically about painful aspects of American history and question state-sanctioned systems of authority. These works are exhibited here with the understanding that this history of systemic violence is not past. For many Americans, it is all too well known and personally felt.