S.F. MOAD ~ United Nations International Year for People of African Descent

SF Museum of the African Diaspora marks 5th year
by Steven Winn, Special to The Chronicle

Grace C. Stanislaus, executive director of the Museum of the African Diaspora, stood near a small vitrine that held a dramatically stylized 19th century Fang head, from Gabon or southern Cameroon. The piece was arguably the prize of MoAD's recent show, "Art/Object: Re-Contextualizing African Art." A wall text mentioned the influence such starkly beautiful African sculptures had on Picasso, Braque and other European artists.

"The form, the line, the strength are all very powerful," Stanislaus said of the piece. "And I like the fact that it had some color." As someone who has done research in West Africa and worked as a director and/or curator at the Museum for African Art, the Bronx Museum of the Arts and the Studio Museum of Harlem before moving to San Francisco in 2009 to assume the lead MoAD post, Stanislaus, 52, knows her material well. But she only wanted to spend so long admiring the Fang head on its plastic sealed pedestal.

What really interested her, said Stanislaus, her gaze roaming around to the other objects and to a dance video playing at the far end of the gallery, was "what role and purpose this object had before it was taken in. Let's bring it back to who the makers were and what they valued - the life outside what scholarship has assigned it."

That kind of connective-tissue way of seeing and thinking about art is emblematic of what Stanislaus hopes to bring to MoAD, which recently marked a fifth anniversary in its three-story glass-fronted home on Mission Street. Stanislaus took over as the institution's second executive director in November 2009. Her predecessor, Denise Bradley, departed in 2007. MoAD, with a mission to showcase "the history, art and the cultural richness that has resulted from the dispersal of Africans throughout the world," racked up some notable achievements in its first five years.

There were exhibitions devoted to photographer Carrie Mae Weems, painter Richard Mayhew, the Hewitt Collection of African American Art and slavery in the California Gold Rush era. "I've Known Rivers," a four-volume digital oral history project, gives voice to first-person stories of the African diaspora. Prominent authors such as Edward P. Jones, Chris Gardner and Charlayne Hunter Gault have given readings and talks. Alonzo King's Lines Ballet and others performed in the space. A 2006 colloquium, "Paris Is Burning (Again)," explored the black Francophone experience. A new show, on jazz and contemporary African American quilts, opened Friday. Titled "Textual Rhythms," it continues through April 24.

Spotty schedule ~ but the museum, which has no permanent collection and must generate its own exhibitions and programming or house touring shows, has also performed under expectations. The exhibition and program schedules have been spotty. Attendance has been modest, with an estimated total of 130,000 visitors, 60,000 of them in the first year. By comparison, the nearby Contemporary Jewish Museum, which also has no collection of its own, has drawn 300,000 through the doors in about half the time (the new CJM building opened in July 2008).

MoAD's fundraising challenges, exacerbated by the financial crisis, have shrunk the annual budget from $3.5 million to $2 million. The "permanent exhibitions," including one on agriculture and another devoted to slave narratives, look tired and in need of rethinking.
Stanislaus makes no grand pronouncements or sweeping agenda-setting proposals. Nor has her avowed love of "robust and intellectually substantive programming" played out yet in many specifics. She speaks in general terms of expanding the public's awareness of the diaspora's origins and global manifestations, broadening the museum's audience base, connecting with more Bay Area schools, rebuilding MoAD's website, enhancing on-site technological capabilities, launching genealogical workshops and deepening the level of scholarship. Hiring a curator is another important step to come.

'Common ancestry'
Behind it all is "this idea that we are all linked by a common humanity and a common ancestry." Possible initiatives include literary and performing arts residencies, a folktale series for younger children and families, more lectures, film festivals and publications. One specific project on Stanislaus' wish list is a show of arts of the 1960s from across the diaspora.

Contemporary Jewish Museum curator Dara Solomon points out that while having no collection allows an institution to be "flexible, contemporary and fresh," when a good show or idea for one crops up, it also means incurring the added costs of loans, insurance and touring exhibition fees.

None of Stanislaus' vision will become reality without a solid institutional and financial foundation. It's here that the director, in her 14 months on the job, has apparently focused her energies and made some significant gains. She has bolstered her board, reached out to a younger donor base, and announced an anonymous gift of $1 million as part of a five-year strategic plan to raise $5 million. While MoAD still receives support from the city's Redevelopment Agency, which hatched the museum under Mayor Willie Brown's administration, there is no endowment and hardly any cash reserve.

Last month's fifth anniversary celebrations included a gala at the Palace Hotel and a Vanguard Launch Party in the Oakland hills, aimed at cultivating young professionals. The hope is that events like these will not be flashy one-offs but steps toward building the constituency of the museum, where memberships hovers around 400.

"I'd like to see it at, oh, thousands," the director says, with one of her infectious smiles.

Stanislaus, who spent the past 11 years as president and CEO of the Romare Bearden Foundation in New York, is engaging and animated, with a resonant personal history. Born on the Caribbean island of Carriacou, she was the youngest of seven children. Her father died when she was 5 months old, and she didn't see her mother, who was working in New York, until she was 8. She and her siblings were eventually reunited in Brooklyn by their mother, who supported them on a licensed practical nurse's salary. All of them went to college.
"My story is an immigrant story," says Stanislaus, who remembers being teased for her Caribbean accent when she first came to New York and "feeling completely like an outsider. I get what it means to enter into a society and try to make your own way."

Stanislaus attended New York's High School for Art and Design, did her undergraduate work at Fordham University and received her master's degree in art history from Columbia.

Stanislaus says she's still adjusting to California after spending most of her life in New York. She lives in the Financial District and walks to work. When she does, she carries years of experience with other midsize museums along with her. "I know what institutions go through at around five years," she says. "It's a time of both challenge and growth. We've made it across the Rubicon here. I'm committed to what lies ahead."

Steven Winn is a freelance writer.