Robert Arneson, Simon 'n Rastus, 1990. Plastic enamel, acrylic, oil on canvas, 94 x 72 inches.
The Manetti Shrem Museum of Art will be hosting a talk on Robert Arneson's Black series. Gwendolyn DuBois Shaw will examine the controversial body of work, which shows Arneson wrestling with complex ideas about racial stereotyping, political demagoguery and his own identity as he simultaneously battled the debilitating cancer that would take his life in 1992. Dubois Shaw is the Senior Historian at the Smithsonian National Portrait Gallery, and is serving as the Manetti Shrem Museum's first Visiting Museum Researcher. The talk will take place on February 23, 2020, at 2:30 pm.