Facilitated by the artist, the museums' acquistion follows a $1 million joint donation from the Ford Foundation and the Hearthland Foundation, a nonprofit tied to actress Kate Capshaw and her husband, the director Steven Spielberg. Proceeds will benefit social justice reform initiatives. (NYT)

The Smithsonian's National Museum of African American History and Culture is in talks with the Speed Art Museum in Louisville, Kentucky, to jointly acquire a painting of Breonna Taylor by Amy Sherald that first appeared on the cover of the September 2020 issue of Vanity Fair. The Smithsonian plans to display the portrait later this year.  

Sherald’s portrait depicts Taylor in a blue flowing gown, designed by Jasmine Elder of the Atlanta-based fashion brand Jibri. Sherald has said that producing this image keeps Breonna alive forever. The portrait will be purchased from the artist, who plans to donate proceeds to causes that support social-justice reform. 

Sherald, who documents the contemporary African American experience through portraits, is best known for her portrait of former First Lady Michelle Obama featured in the Smithsonian’s National Portrait Gallery. Another portrait by Sherald, Grand Dame Queenie, is on display in the museum’s art gallery. 

The Speed Art Museum will show Breonna Taylor's portrait first in the exhibition, Promise, Witness, Remembrance, opening to the public on Wednesday, April 7, 2021 through June 6, 2021. The exhibition reflects on the life of Breonna Taylor, her killing in 2020, and the year of protests that followed, in Louisville and around the world. The exhibition explores the dualities between a personal, local story and the nation's reflection on the promise, witness, and remembrance of too many Black lives lost to gun violence.

Promise, Witness, Remembrance is guest-curated by Allison Glenn, a writer and Associate Curator, Contemporary Art at Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art in Bentonville, Arkansas. She worked with a National Advisory Panel on the exhibition development along with a Steering Committee of Louisville artists, activists, and mental health advocates. The advisors included arts strategist Mecca Brooks; artist and Founder and Executive Director of Rebuild Foundation Theaster Gates; multidisciplinary filmmaker, curator, and arts administrator Jon-Sesrie Goff; retired military officer and cousin of Alton Sterling Raymond Green; artist advocate and cousin of Trayvon Martin, La Keisha Leek; painter Amy Sherald; multidisciplinary artist, co-founder of The Wide Awakes and For Freedoms Hank Willis Thomas; and art historian Dr. Allison K. Young.

"What's happened in Louisville is not an isolated occurrence, but rather an echo of the paradox of the time and place we are living in. The story of Breonna Taylor is part of a larger history of the United States that we must contend with. We live in a country where a woman of color is Vice President, but the family of Breonna Taylor has not gotten the justice they've sought," said curator Allison Glenn. "It's been a privilege to work with both the national panel, local community, and Breonna's family to explore and articulate these, and other, dualities."

"In Louisville, the killing of Breonna Taylor and a year of protests have changed the course of our city; we need healing," said Speed art Museum director Stephen Reily. "At the Speed, we hope that Allison's practice of engaging artists with public reality will help our city and the people we serve, to find a way forward."

Promise, Witness, Remembrance will remain on view through Sunday, June 6, 2021, and will span all five galleries in the Speed's original 1927 neoclassical building.