Farewell to revolutionary artist Dana Chandler

When Boston artist and social activist Dana Chandler Jr. died on June 9 at the age of 84, he left not only the legacy of his art. He created an institution in 1978 that also lives on: the African American Master Artists-in-Residence Program (AAMARP), in affiliation with Northeastern University (NEU). Through that institution, participants and audiences can experience Chandler’s love of art and community.

Dana Chandler with his artwork PHOTO: Reginald L Jackson

Professor Emeritus Reginald Jackson, Chandler’s colleague at Simmons College, told the Banner how the affiliation with Northeastern came about.

“Dana’s studio was ransacked one weekend while he was away,” Jackson said. “Dana went to the African American Institute at NEU and they led him to then-President Ryder, who requested space for Dana to setup a studio. Then Dana got the idea to bring master artists to share divided space to create the AAMARP.”

Next year from February 12 through August 2, the Institute of Contemporary Art (ICA) will display works by artists affiliated with the AAMARP. Along with Chandler’s art, the exhibition will include works by Benny Andrews, Barbara Ward Armstrong, Ellen Banks, Calvin Burnett, L’Merchie Frazier, Kofi Kayiga, Renée Stout, Arnold Trachtman, John Wilson, Richard Yarde and Theresa India-Young. 

“Art is not a mirror held up to reality but a hammer with which to shape it. — Dana Chandler PHOTO: NORTHEASTERN UNIVERSITY ARCHIVES AND SPECIAL COLLECTIONS

“Dana C. Chandler Jr.’s impact on the arts community in Boston is immeasurable,” ICA curator Jeffrey De Blois told the Banner. “His art was brash and direct, frequently taking the multifarious, interlocking forms of American racism as its subject. Beyond his influential artwork, he was a tireless advocate for Boston’s Black artists, especially through the African American Master Artists-in-Residence Program he founded at Northeastern University. Chandler was a pillar in the community, someone who believed irrevocably in the transformative power of art and museums, a champion of access and someone who held the city’s arts institutions accountable.”

Chandler’s own work is on display at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, where visitors can see his artistry, including, “Black People break free of the Sucking, Mother-F—ing White Egg,” (from the portfolio The Fifteen Days of May) and “Fred Hampton’s Door 2.”

Being taken seriously by the MFA as a Black artist did not occur until Chandler wrote the 1970 letter “A Proposal to Eradicate Institutional Racism at the Boston Museum of Fine Arts” to the museum’s director, Perry T. Rathbone, copying the board of directors and the media. In the letter, Chandler stated: “Through all the history of America, white museums have ignored, avoided and denied their obligation to portray the contributions of the black man to American history, be it cultural, scientific or aesthetic. We find this museum no different. … We can’t believe that this is simple ignorance or unconscious racism — but we’ll soon know.”   

Dana Chandler, standing right PHOTO: NORTHEASTERN UNIVERSITY ARCHIVES AND SPECIAL COLLECTION

Nowadays, the MFA acknowledges the value of Chandler’s art. Carmen Hermo, the MFA’s Lorraine and Alan Bressler Curator of Contemporary Art, told the Banner, “Chandler was a beacon for the arts community in Boston. His artworks made bold statements in bright and culturally responsive colors that drew on the past, present and future of Black liberation movements. While building the AAMARP as a space for creativity across many disciplines, he also taught new generations of artists, and frequently visited and advised the MFA over the decades, keeping the critical pressure on. His work is currently on view in the contemporary galleries at the MFA, where it speaks to his visionary and urgent belief that art must speak back to our times.”     

Chandler’s work continues to provide a necessary context for creative achievement in the Black community. Born in Lynn and raised in Roxbury, from the 1940s on Chandler experienced the intimate violence of local racism. Having withstood this, his resilience led him to help build an artistic community in Boston.

“Dana C. Chandler has been monumental to the Black Arts Movement and well beyond,” said Jackson. “Dana intrinsically knew that the business of making art was not just an in-studio pursuit although he knew the importance of occupation of space in an uninterrupted way. Dana has done what no other person has done arguably worldwide; created an institution that has endured for almost half a century to nurture and support artists of African descent to be nurtured and supported.”

Quoted at the St. Louis, Mo.-based Black Art Auction, which is dedicated solely selling art created by African Americans, Chandler said, “Black art is not a decoration. It’s a revolutionary force.”

His unwillingness to separate art from its political dimension places him in a cultural tradition that removes the aesthetic from its cultural assumptions. As Bertolt Brecht, the German poet, playwright and director wrote, “Art is not a mirror held up to reality but a hammer with which to shape it.”