The Art Museum of West Virginia University’s popular Art Up Close! Series returns September 12 featuring Marjorie Fuller, director of WVU’s Center for Black Culture & Research. 

Fuller will give a presentation on the print “Confrontation at the Bridge” by artist Jacob Lawrence. The program begins at 5:30 p.m. in the Museum Education Center Grand Hall and is free and open to the public.

Lawrence, a New York artist, was one of the first artists trained in and by the African American community in Harlem. Lawrence was commissioned in 1976 to create prints to celebrate the United States' bicentennial and chose to depict the March 7, 1965, march in Selma, Alabama, on the Edmund Pettus Bridge where protestors objected to the denial of African Americans' right to vote. In the print, Lawrence symbolized the malicious attack by law enforcement by simply representing the oppressors by a vicious dog on the left side of the bridge. Due in part to this event, Congress and President Lyndon B. Johnson signed the Voting Rights Act later that year.

Fuller is a twenty-five-year professional in the areas of diversity and Pan-African studies, and prior to coming to West Virginia University, she was a professor in the Department of Pan African Studies at Kent State University. She sits on the executive board of the National Association of Black Culture Centers, and is a past national representative of Black and Multicultural Professionals in International Education. Fuller is also a member of other national organizations such as National Association of Women Educators, and American Association of Blacks in Higher Education. She is currently completing her dissertation for her doctoral degree in higher education administration and leadership Studies. 

For more information on the museum, visit artmuseum.wvu.edu.