What was the political legacy of the Harlem Renaissance? In the final episode, we’ll explore the lasting impact of the art and organizing that happened during the 1920s and ’30s and how it paved the way for the civil rights movement. We’ll highlight some key political events of the time and explore the work of artists such as Romare Bearden and Augusta Savage. We’ll also touch upon what it means for The Met to tell this story in 2024, more than fifty years after its controversial exhibition “Harlem on My Mind.”

Learn more about the exhibition at metmuseum.org/HarlemRenaissance

Objects featured in this episode:

Romare Bearden, The Block, 1971

Augusta Savage, Lift Every Voice and Sing (The Harp), 1939

Guests:

Mary Schmidt Campbell, curator, writer, historian and former president of Spelman college

Jordan Casteel, artist

Denise Murell, curator of the exhibition The Harlem Renaissance and Transatlantic Modernism

Bridget R. Cooks, Chancellor’s Fellow and professor of art history and African American studies at the University of California, Irvine

Original poem: Major Jackson’s “The Block (for Romie)”

For a transcript of this episode and more information, visit metmuseum.org/HarlemIsEverywhere

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Harlem Is Everywhere is produced by The Metropolitan Museum of Art in collaboration with Audacy's Pineapple Street Studios.

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What were the sounds of the Harlem Renaissance? Jazz and blues exploded onto the scene. People flocked to uptown venues like the Savoy Ballroom, where they could dance the Lindy Hop all night long. In this episode, we’ll learn how the music of the Renaissance was part of a larger boundary-breaking nightlife that involved gambling, speakeasies, and hole-in-the-wall clubs where people could express gender and sexuality in new ways. We’ll learn about the artists, musicians, and performers who embodied this spirit of creative experimentation and transgression—and whose work remains fresh decades later.

Learn more about the exhibition at metmuseum.org/HarlemRenaissance

Objects featured in this episode:

James Van Der Zee, [Person in a Fur-Trimmed Ensemble], 1926

Jacob Lawrence, Pool Parlor, 1942

Archibald Motley Jr. paintings: The Liar, 1936; and Picnic, 1934

Guests:

James Smalls, art historian and professor

Richard J. Powell, art historian and professor

Christian McBride, Grammy Award winning musician and composer

Original poem: Carl Phillips’s “At the Reception”

For a transcript of this episode and more information, visit metmuseum.org/HarlemIsEverywhere

#HarlemIsEverywhere

Harlem Is Everywhere is produced by The Metropolitan Museum of Art in collaboration with Audacy's Pineapple Street Studios.

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

How did the literature of the Harlem Renaissance play a central role in conversations around Black identity in America and abroad? In this episode we’ll learn about publications like Opportunity, The Crisis, and Fire!! which each promoted a unique political and aesthetic perspective on Black life at the time. We’ll learn about Langston Hughes and Zora Neale Hurston before they became household names and explore how collaboration and conversation between artists, writers, and scholars came to define the legacy of the Harlem Renaissance.

Learn more about the exhibition at metmuseum.org/HarlemRenaissance

Objects featured in this episode:

Laura Wheeler Waring’s covers of The Crisis, September 1924 and April 1923

Winold Reiss, Cover of Opportunity: Journal of Negro Life, February 1925

Winold Reiss, Langston Hughes, 1925

Aaron Douglas, Miss Zora Neale Hurston, 1926

Guests:

Monica L. Miller, Ann Whitney Olin Professor of English and Africana Studies, Barnard College, Columbia University

John Keene, poet and novelist

For a transcript of this episode and more information, visit metmuseum.org/HarlemIsEverywhere

#HarlemIsEverywhere

Harlem Is Everywhere is produced by The Metropolitan Museum of Art in collaboration with Audacy's Pineapple Street Studios.

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.