May 10 - August 2, 2008
Special Opening: April 25, 6 p.m.

Podcast:
Ronald K. Brown's interview by St. John Flynn on KUHF (The Front Row, 5/28/2008)

Rhapsody in Black and White is part of a collaborative project between Blaffer, the Cynthia Woods Mitchell Center for the Arts, DiverseWorks, and the Society for the Performing Arts (SPA). Co-curated by world-renowned choreographer Ronald K. Brown and leading photographic arts expert Deborah Willis, it features the work of African-American photojournalist Charles "Teenie" Harris, who worked at the Pittsburgh Courier from 1936 to 1975.

The exhibition is organized in conjunction with Brown's major new choreographic work, One Shot, which will be presented by DiverseWorks and SPA at downtown's Wortham Theatre Center on Saturday, May 10. One Shot was inspired by "Teenie" Harris's photographs, housed at the Carnegie Museum of Art, which encompass the world's largest image archive of African-American life. Leading up to the exhibition and performance, Brown will conduct teaching residencies at the University of Houston and will work with elementary school children in the Third Ward at Project Row Houses' after-school program.

Charles “Teenie” Harris: Rhapsody in Black and White is presented by the Cynthia Woods Mitchell Center for the Arts at the University of Houston. This exhibition is part of a city-wide collaboration with DiverseWorks and Society for the Performing Arts, with additional partners, Project Row Houses and Blaffer Gallery, the Art Museum of the University of Houston. The exhibition is made possible through the generous support of the Alcoa Foundation. The images on view in the exhibition are from the Charles “Teenie” Harris Archive of Carnegie Museum of Art, Pittsburgh. The exhibition is organized by August Wilson Center for African American Culture with the help of Carnegie Museum of Art, Pittsburgh and PMG Arts Management.

Also presented in conjunction with the exhibition:

Shifts in Time, a series of short vignettes of African American community as documented by Jack Yates High School teachers and students, University of Houston students, and community residents, will be presented concurrently with Charles "Teenie" Harris: Rhapsody in Black and White in the video room at Blaffer. The project was headed by Carroll Parrott Blue, a visiting professor in UH's College of Education and Visiting Scholar in UH's African American Studies program and Joe Lambert, The Center for Digital Storytelling Director. The participants combined the photographs of Charles "Teenie" Harris and the Jack Yates High School student photographs from the Eye on Third Ward, a fourteen year initiative directed by Ray Carrington III, Jack Yates High School photography instructor. Yates teachers Carolyn Durham, Velda Hunter, Terri Williams, and Ray Carrington and their students will lead the Rhapsody in Black and White Brown Bag Gallery Tour on Wednesday, May 14 at 12 noon. Admission to the gallery tour is free, and lunch will be provided.