BIRMINGHAM, AL.- The Birmingham Museum of Art presents a major exhibition of new work by nationally acclaimed artist and Birmingham native Kerry James Marshall. On display from February 6 through April 24, 2005, Kerry James Marshall: One True Thing, Meditations on Black Aesthetics examines black history, identity, and cultural tradition through more than 40 works, including paintings, sculpture, photography, installation, and video. The artist will be in attendance for opening weekend festivities, including a symposium on black aesthetics and the unveiling of his model for a new public artwork commissioned for downtown Birmingham.* Admission to the exhibition is free.

"Marshall is among the most important artists of our time," states Emily Hanna, Ph.D., curator of the exhibition in Birmingham, "This exhibition is especially meaningful for us in Birmingham because Marshall spent his early years here, and the city's history has shaped his work in an important way."

"You can't be born in Birmingham, Alabama, in 1955, and grow up in South Central [Los Angeles] near the Black Panthers headquarters, and not feel like you've got some kind of social responsibility," said Marshall. "You can't move to Watts in 1963 and not speak about it. That determined a lot of where my work was going to go."

A painter, photographer, printmaker, and installation artist, Marshall's remarkable talent has earned him a coveted MacArthur Fellow "genius" award. Best known for large-scale paintings that reflect his engagement with social history, the civil rights movement, and his experiences as an African American, Marshall is represented in more than 30 public collections, including the Art Institute of Chicago, the Whitney Museum of American Art, San Francisco's Museum of Modern Art, and The Birmingham Museum of Art.

Kerry James Marshall: One True Thing, Meditations on Black Aesthetics represents a new direction in Marshall's work in which he opens a dialogue on the issue of black aesthetics, the practice of being an artist, the question of integration versus assimilation, and notions of race.

The term black aesthetics first emerged within the 1960s civil rights and Black Power movements as a way to raise awareness for black rights, foster black cultural pride, and develop strategies for African Americans to participate more actively in the mainstream of U.S. society. Throughout this exhibition, Marshall has drawn upon the dense and unique layering of language, music, and art characteristic of black expression to infuse Western art-historical styles with the political and social realities of the African-American experience.