The Arts Council of Tuscaloosa will be hosting “Stand Up!: Ten Mighty Women Who Made a Change” in The Arts Council Gallery at the Dinah Washington Cultural Arts Center. A project of The Holle Center for Communication Arts at The University of Alabama, the exhibit will be on display April 5-May 24, 2024.
This exhibit celebrates the debut picture book of the same title by Dr. Brittney Cooper, professor of Women’s, Gender, and Sexuality Studies and Africana Studies at Rutgers University, with illustrations by
Cathy Ann Johnson. Inspiring text and dynamic illustrations bring to life both famous and unsung Black
women who took a stand and made the world a better place for future generations.

Events:

- April 5, 2024: Exhibit Opening during First Friday from 5-7 p.m. at the Dinah Washington Cultural Arts
Center; author Brittney Cooper and illustrator Cathy Ann Johnson of “Stand Up!” speak about the
book and exhibit at 6 p.m.

- May 3, 2024: First Friday event 5-7 p.m. at the Dinah Washington Cultural Arts Center; Panel Discussion
about the book and art exhibit with panelists:

·         Moderator: Dr. Darlene F. Atkins, Principal of Westlawn Middle School

·         Katherine Baxter, Librarian at Martin Luther King, Jr. Elementary

·         Ramona Caponegro, Professor in Youth Services, UA School of Library and Information Studies

·         Exa Skinner, Executive Director of Kentuck Art Center and Festival

“Stand Up! Ten Mighty Women Who Made a Change” is curated by Nicole Simpson, Associate Curator of

Prints and Drawings at the Zimmerli Art Museum located at Rutgers University. This exhibition is also

supported by PNC “Grow Up Great.” The program is a $350 million, multi-year, bilingual initiative that

began in 2004 to help prepare children from birth to age 5 for success in school and life. To date, the

program has served more than 2 million children.

The UA Department of Art and Art History presents the Master of Fine Arts thesis exhibition of Nathan Childers, titled Still Lives, from April 5 through May 3, 2024, in The University of Alabama Gallery in the Dinah Washington Cultural Arts Center in Tuscaloosa. A reception for the artist will be held Friday, April 5, from 5:00 to 7:00 p.m. during downtown Tuscaloosa’s First Friday Art Walk.

Nathan Childers, “Between Us,” 2024, oil on wood panel, 20 x 16 inches. Image courtesy of the artist.
Childers writes that his exhibition Still Lives is “an invitation into the home of a couple who feel the impact of current anti-queer backlash in the United States. These paintings in oil on panel bring together figures and the interior spaces they inhabit in order to evoke a sense of stillness. The feeling of quiet contemplation is born equally of the couple’s tranquil companionship and the reality that their lives are on pause in the face of social pressures.”