📣 ACQUISITION – Pentimenti is thrilled to announce the acquisition of Brandon J. Donahue Shipp’s "Bathtime (Blue)" and "Basketball Bloom (Jet Competition II)" by the Petrucci Family Foundation Collection of African American Art.
In “Bathtime (Blue)”, Brandon repurposes T-shirts as his surface, using an airbrush technique developed in his youth. His work focuses on quiet, intimate moments, preserving everyday scenes as reflections on the softness and depth of Black life.
Across both bodies of work, he explores identity, resilience, and transformation. “Basketball Bloom (Jet Competition II)”, made from found basketballs arranged like mandalas, symbolizes rebirth and community strength.
The Petrucci Family Foundation Collection of African American Art is dedicated to supporting, creating opportunities, and fostering learning to serve its community. Since 2012, the Foundation has been collecting works by Black artists, grounded in the belief that American history cannot be fully understood without a deep understanding of African American history.
Pentimenti extends its sincere thanks to the Petrucci Family Foundation Collection of African American Art and Claudia Volpe, Director & Curator, for their support of Brandon J. Donahue Shipp.
Image I - Bathtime (Blue), 55 x 56 x 1.5 inches / 138 x 142 x 4 cm, acrylic, oil, collage on gessoed T-shirts, 2025
Image II - Basketball Bloom (Jet Competition II), 44 x 48 x 10 inches / 112 x 122 x 25.4 cm, found and collected basketballs, shoestrings, 2024
Elizabeth Colomba is a French-born artist now living in New York. Known for reimagining Black women in historical and classical settings, Colomba draws on techniques of the Old Masters to address the erasure of Black people in Western art. She has remarked that Black women are absent in European art and has made it her mission to center them in her work. She does this by reinserting these figures into myths and narratives within her paintings. Her works often depict these women as powerful and elegant, highlighting features such as natural hair, head wraps, and darker skin tones.
Through her art, short films, or her graphic novel “Queenie” (a story about Stephanie St. Clair), Colomba creates space for Black women to be seen as powerful, complex, and central characters in history. Colomba stated that “by generating an environment for my subjects to inhabit a space that honors their presence and place in and through culture and time allows me to redefine not only how black people have been conditioned to exist, but also how black people have been conditioned to reflect upon themselves.”
In “Dionysus,” it shows a woman reclined on a couch, appearing bewitched by music played by a hidden figure. The wall behind her shows the gods Dionysus and Athena and their influence. In Colomba’s catalog, “Limbo: The Collective Unconscious”, it states, “The music played by the figure behind the curtain… slides the lounger into torpor, a sleep of death. In this representation, Dionysus seems to surrender to fate. As the last drop of wine hits the ground, the tamed wild animal and she are looking outside the confinement of the frame, seeking an answer.”
Colomba studied illustration and graphic arts at the Estienne School of Art in Paris before enrolling at the École nationale supérieure des Beaux-Arts. Before fully dedicating to painting, Colomba worked as a storyboard artist in the film industry. Her paintings have been exhibited at institutions such as the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Musée d'Orsay, and Columbia University Wallach Art Gallery. Her work is also in permanent collections such as The Studio Museum in Harlem and Park Avenue Armory, to name a few.
#pffcollection
We are fortunate to be exhibiting a painting by the 19th-century artist Charles Ethan Porter, on loan from the Petrucci Family Foundation Collection of African American Art.
Charles Ethan Porter was born in Hartford, Connecticut in 1847. Though he grew up in poverty, he was one of the first African Americans to study at the National Academy of Design. The Hartford Daily Times praised his work in a review that drew significant attention, including that of Mark Twain, who was also living in Hartford at the time. Impressed with the artist and his work, Twain provided Porter with the financial support to travel abroad with letters of introduction from him in hand.
Porter studied at École des Arts Décoratifs in Paris and was introduced to both the Barbizon school and Impressionism. Upon his return to the United States in 1885, Porter briefly opened a studio in New York, but later returned to Hartford. In 1889, he moved to Rockville, Connecticut and joined the Connecticut Academy of Fine Arts. Porter’s career was continually challenged by racism, and by the end of his life, he faced near obscurity. He died in 1923.
Today, Porter’s work is getting more and more of the attention and praise it deserves, and it can be found in the collections of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Smithsonian American Art Museum, the National Gallery of Art, Lyman Allyn Art Museum, the Wadsworth Atheneum, and the Connecticut Historical Society.
-Courtesy of the Petrucci Foundation.
@pff_collection@artyardcenter
Overturned Basket of Apples, oil on canvas, 20 1/8” x 24 1/8”, c. 1880
📣 ACQUISITION – Pentimenti is thrilled to announce the acquisition of La Vaughn Belle’s “Storm (how to imagine the tropicalia as monumental—as in when people turn into trees)” and “Swarm (001_2023)” by the Petrucci Family Foundation Collection of African American Art.
In honor of the close of Black History Month, we also celebrate the vision and creativity of La Vaughn Belle and the Petrucci Family Foundation.
Both series, Storm and Swarm, explore themes of transformation, resilience, and the layered histories embedded in the landscape and environment of the U.S. Virgin Islands.
The Petrucci Family Foundation Collection of African American Art is dedicated to supporting, creating opportunities, and fostering learning to serve its community. Since 2012, the Foundation has been collecting works by Black artists, grounded in the belief that American history cannot be fully understood without a deep understanding of African American history.
Image I – Storm (how to imagine the tropicalia as monumental—as in when people turn into trees), 47 x 68 inches / 119 x 172 cm, charcoal, ink, acrylic, glitter with cuts and burns on paper, 2023.
Image II – Swarm (001_2023), 24 x 36 inches / 61 x 91 cm, cuts and burns on printed photographs, 1/1, 2023.
Image III – La Vaughn Belle, Studio View
For over sixty years, Sir Richard Sheridan Patrick Michael Aloysius Franklin Bowling OBE RA, better known as Sir Frank Bowling, has explored new ways to use paint, testing the limits of scale, materials, and technique in abstraction. Born in British Guiana (now Guyana) in 1934, Bowling moved to London in 1953. At first he enrolled at the City & Guilds of London Art School, but eventually graduated from the the Royal College of Art in London in 1962, where he studied alongside artists like David Hockney and R. B. Kitaj, and earned a silver medal for painting. After he finished school, Bowling moved to New York in 1966. Starting out in expressionism and pop art, he soon shifted to expressive abstraction, incorporating personal memories, his own life story, and social and political themes into his art. He focused even more on abstraction and worked to challenge the art world’s limited view of Black artists.
As a contributing editor for Arts Magazine from 1969 to 1972 and as curator of the exhibition 5+1, Bowling strongly supported abstraction as a valuable space for Black artists. Bowling’s art explores light, color, and materials. In 2005, He became a Royal Academician and received the OBE for Services to Art in 2008. In 2020, he was knighted in the Queen’s Birthday Honours and also was awarded an Honorary Doctorate from the Royal College. Two years later, he received the Wolfgang Hahn Prize, which honors outstanding contemporary artists. Bowling’s work is part of more than 50 major collections worldwide, including the 50th Venice Biennale, Tate Britain, MFA Boston, and SFMOMA. He was also featured in the BBC documentary Frank Bowling’s Abstract World.
As a key figure in this form of abstraction, Bowling once said, “I’ve set out on a quest to explore the possibilities of paint, and I find myself making something new every time. I have an insatiable determination to experiment with colour, form and process, to create new and original artworks that push the boundaries of the medium, while being intellectually grounded in post-war abstraction.”
Bowling works in his South London studio
#frankbowling #pffcollection #blackartists #abstractart #contemporaryart
Ann Graves Tanksley (b. 1934, Pittsburgh, PA) was drawn to art from an early age. Tanksley maintained an interest in creative self-expression and earned a B.F.A. from the Carnegie Institute of Technology (now Carnegie Mellon University) in 1956. After graduating college, she married and dedicated herself to full-time motherhood.
Tanksley worked in art education, holding teaching positions at Queens Youth Center for the Arts (1959 – 1962), the Arts Center of Northern New Jersey (1963), and working as an adjunct art instructor at Suffolk County Community College from 1973 to 1975. She simultaneously continued her own artistic development, taking classes at the Art Students League, The New School, The Paulette Singer Workshop, and the Robert Blackburn Printmaking Workshop where she learned monotype printing techniques.
Tanksley began exhibiting her work as early as the late 1960s. During the Civil Rights Movement, art became a vehicle for her to process the weight of her emotions in response to the political moment and collective rage and urgency felt by Black Americans. These works were noted for their flat composition, loose brushwork, melancholic figures, and shocks of unexpectedly bright color. The focus on social commentary eventually began to negatively impact her, and Tanksley decided to pivot toward depicting black joy, celebration, and uplifting everyday scenes.
In 1971, Ann Tanksley was among the first members of Where We At: Black Women Artists, Inc., a New York women’s art collective founded by Kay Brown, Dingda McCannon, and Faith Ringgold. One of her early group shows was the collective’s 1972 exhibit, “Cooking and Smokin’” at the Weusi-Nyumba Ya Sanaa Gallery in Harlem, New York.
A deep admirer of Zora Neale Hurston’s writing, Ann Tanksley eagerly took an opportunity to collaborate with psychoanalyst Hugh F. Butts in the 1980s to illustrate his book about Hurston. Though his book was never published, the 60 monoprints that Tanksley created for the publication were shown across the United States in the ‘90s and early 2000s to great critical acclaim. #anntanksley #pffcollection #africanamericanart #blackwomanartist
Kahlil Robert Irving (b. 1992, San Diego, CA) is a contemporary artist based in St. Louis, whose work expands beyond traditional art. Irving earned a BFA in Art History and Ceramics from the Kansas City Art Institute in 2015. He distinguished himself as an MFA Fellow at the Sam Fox School of Design and Visual Art at Washington University in St. Louis in 2017. Irving is known for his ceramic sculptures that combine layered images with sculptures modeled after everyday objects, while exploring the history of the medium and questioning cultural traditions and ideas about identity in the Western world. Irving’s artwork confronts violent legacies that shape daily environments.
Irving has stated, “My process and my practice are invested in invention. Using ceramic material, I can make clay act as a vessel, transform it into an object that resembles something from life, or allow it to simply look like clay or ceramic itself—blobby, rock-like, something earthy. The sculptures are doing all three of those things at the same time, creating a complication between representation and form.”
While Irving’s practice has expanded into prints, wallpapers, and digital media, ceramics remain at the center of his work. Much of Irving’s art draws from the overlooked and ordinary: street textures, packaging, digital images, and fragments of urban life. These objects, often dismissed as trash or temporary, become the foundation of his sculptures, transformed into something long-lasting.
This choice reflects his interest in memory and identity, particularly the ways in which Black life and culture are represented—or ignored—within mainstream narratives. His works act like archives, preserving the materials and images that define our time. In this way, Irving’s work is not just about ceramics, but about how the smallest objects of daily life carry deep cultural meaning.
#KahlilRobertIrving #pffcollection #africanamericanart #ContemporaryArtist #BlackArtist #CeramicArt
Opening reception this Thursday, January 15th, 5-6:30 PM!
“Echoes of Our Future” honors the powerful and enduring legacy of Black artists whose lives and works intersect with the city of Philadelphia. As the birthplace of American democracy commemorates its 250th anniversary, this exhibition reframes the historical arc of the city through the lens of Black artistic excellence, cultural stewardship, and radical imagination.
Philadelphia’s rich artistic lineage is not just told through its institutions but through its classrooms, sidewalks, living rooms, churches, and community centers. Many of the featured artists were not only creatives but mentors, educators, and activists rooted in Philadelphia’s neighborhoods. Some were born here. Others came to teach, study, or organize and in doing so, became integral to the city’s evolving cultural identity.
As a forward-facing platform, “Echoes of Our Future” also initiates “The Next 250”, a living educational project that empowers students across the region to define Philadelphia’s artistic future through workshops, mentorship, and visual storytelling.
To view this exhibition, visit the Barbara Crawford Gallery (500 W. Willow Grove Ave, Philadelphia, PA 19118) during open community hours:
January 15 | 5-6:30 PM • January 19 | 10 AM-12 PM • January 31 I 12 - 1 PM • February 21 | 12 -2 PM • March 7 | 12 - 2 PM
#philadelphia #phillyart #semiquincentennial #philadelphiaart #africanamericanart
📣 Acquisition News 📣I’m very happy to announce that “The Restoration / Crowned in Memory” (2025) and “The Restoration / Not Your Blackamoor” (2025) have been acquired by the Petrucci Family Foundation Collection of African American Art (@pff_collection ). Their continued support of my work and dedication to preserving and amplifying the stories and works of Black artists mean the world to me. With this acquisition, four of my works now live within their collection.
I’m immensely grateful to @galeriemyrtis for their role in this process, and for their thoughtful & intentional approach to placing my work in collections that truly value and honor it.
About PFF:
Founded in 2006, the Petrucci Family Foundation (PFF) actively responds to the needs of the communities it serves, with the mission of supporting education and creating opportunity for Americans at every stage of and station of life. The PFF Collection of African American Art is a targeted initiative to bring focus to the full range of African American visual creativity and its essential place in the history and discourse of American art. This important collection, the result of a partnership between Lehigh University professor Berrisford Boothe and regional real-estate developer Jim Petrucci, has received national attention following its exhibition at the Portland Museum of Art in 2017.
Shortened Statement for “The Restoration”:
The Restoration is not about repair, but return. In this series, these restored figures become a part of a larger photographic series. In these portraits, the dolls rest in the arms of Black children and families, restored with care and dignity, and positioned within compositions that honor, rather than dehumanize.
At its core, The Restoration also exists to confront the circulation of these objects calling attention to their harmful legacy while advocating for their removal from commercial markets, and their continued placement within museums and institutions as evidence of a past that must be studied and examined.
We are absolutely thrilled to unveil a brand new website and browsing experience for the PFF Collection! Over 600 artworks, 284 artists, 52 loans and exhibitions, and dozens of videos, collection highlights, and never-before-seen installation and event images have been migrated to our new website and database!
Here are some of the features we're most excited about:
🎨 Improved Artwork Browsing 🎨
Users can now sort by Artwork Year, Title, and Artist's name. Plus, you can filter by size, date range, medium, and keywords!
🖼 More Object Details 🖼
Including: Multiple units of measurement, additional object views, descriptions, provenance, and exhibition and publication history.
👨🎨 More Artist Information 👩🎨
In addition to artist biographies, you can now see where their work has been exhibited, along with other related info, including videos, press, and publications.
🏛 Comprehensive Exhibition Info 🏛
Each loan and exhibition record now offers a comprehensive overview of featured artworks, installation views, videos, related artists, and all other connected content, including press releases, excerpts from catalogs, special event photos, and more.
See these changes for yourselves at
MASSIVE thanks to @artinadigital for handling the data migration and website set-up!
#artcollection #pffcollection #arthistory #artresource #arteducation #americanart #africanamericanart #blackartinamerica
