Scope and Contents note

Contemporary Visual Expressions was a 1987 exhibition on Black American artists of the 20th century. It featured the work of Washington artists Sam Gilliam, Martha Jackson-Jarvis, and Keith Morrison, as well as guest artist William T. Williams of New York City. It was the inaugural exhibition in the gallery space in the new home of the Anacostia Museum and presented cultural dimensions found in abstract painting, symbolism within the Afro-Caribbean and Afro-American religious traditions in art, as well as three-dimensional works derived from folk and cultural customs that emerge from the Black Experience.