Happy Friday! I’m so excited to share my latest publication is now available for preorder in paperback. This was truly a labor of love, and the result of a promise I made to my students 5 years ago. I want to thank them for going on this journey with me.
Collective Yearning: Black Women Artists from the Zimmerli Art Museum
tgersuniversitypress.org/collective-yearning/9781978842847
Release Date: 12th May 2026
Contributors: Nicole Simpson (Foreword), Amber N. Wiley, Heather Hart, Kyle b. co., Desiree Morales, Jasmine Daria Cannon, Grace Lynne Haynes, Emily Hu, Michael Randall, Helen Gao, Grace Kim, and Audrey Roclore
When Rutgers professor Amber N. Wiley began teaching her African American Art class in 2018, she and her students made a shocking discovery. While the university’s Zimmerli Art Museum had over seventy thousand artworks in its collection, only one of the pieces on display was by a Black American woman. The students, who came from a variety of majors and reflected the ethnic diversity of New Jersey itself, agreed something needed to be done to correct this imbalance. And so begins the story of the groundbreaking exhibition: Collective Yearning.
In this book, Wiley tells the story of how she and her student curators took a deep dive into the Zimmerli’s holdings to recover, catalog, and display its art by Black women. Along the way, contributors discuss the ethics of curation, the history of African American expressive traditions, and the institutional biases that erase or marginalize Black female perspectives. Richly illustrated with pieces from the exhibition, including little-seen work by such visionaries as Faith Ringgold, Renée Stout, and Kara Walker, Collective Yearning makes a powerful statement on the importance of showcasing Black women artists.
A very happy pub day to Model Schools in the Model City: Race, Planning, and Education in the Nation’s Capital by Amber N. Wiley!
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With this book, Amber N. Wiley emphasizes the value of education as a means for social equality—Black Americans wanted the American Dream to apply to them, and equal opportunity for quality education was at the forefront of making that dream a reality. Model Schools in the Model City chronicles how Black Washingtonians used public education as a means of racial uplift in the face of entrenched white resistance and repeated assertions of white supremacy. For Black Washingtonians, it was the school building—a permanent structure, made of sturdy material—that was the physical realization of Black liberation, agency, and the right to exist as citizens of the United States.
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Now available at your favorite indie bookstore!
Happy pub day to Collective Yearning! This book was years in the making. It started from a class assignment that turned into a seminar that turned into an exhibition with related programming that turned into a publication. While I shepherded this project along, much of the work is student produced. Kudos to my student curators and authors, and all my collaborators. We did that!
Order your copy now, tgersuniversitypress.org/collective-yearning/9781978842847. Get 30% OFF • Use code RUP30.
Here are some photos from the past few weeks and the curatorial discussion with Diana Greenwald at Rutgers which accompanied the Allan Rohan Crite exhibit. It was also my official book launch event. So much fun! And so many pics with family, friends, and students (but also so many pics I somehow didn’t take 😩). And the random Johnson (Arkansas) cousin sighting in the Newark airport as she was heading back to Detroit and I was going back to OKC. So much fun!
I made some art back in January. It was in an art show in February at @positivespace_tul . I have not made any art since.
Which is why I signed up for a collage art class at @okcontemporary that starts next week because I need a jumpstart, consistency and accountability. I thank @ebonyimandallas and her co-curators for the chance to display my work and @aprilmarci for the inspiration to take a class.
Title: On Roaming, mixed media collage, 2026.
Whew! I was on the go all last week. Stay tuned for my updates from the trip to Jersey. In the meantime… enjoy these snapshots from yesterday’s 40th Oklahoma Foundation for Excellence Academic Awards Celebration. These awards honor great achievements of Oklahoma’s public school students, teachers, faculty and administrators from K-12, colleges and universities. It is a true testament to the value of public education in our state, one that you rarely see in the national media. I had a ball and was so inspired.
As an Academic All-State alum and a trustee of the Oklahoma Foundation of Excellence, I was invited to speak with this year’s crop of All-Staters. When I tell you these young people are amazing.
I also had the honor and pleasure of having as my banquet guest, my high school Spanish teacher Sra. Marybeth Dailey. She has the distinction of being the only teacher to have me as a student for four years. Yall know I love Spanish, but I loved her classroom even more.
Congratulations to all the Academic All-Staters, and a special shout out to ESFHS’s own Brooks Davis, Ilakiya Raghavendiran, and Emme Shum.
P.S. Oklahoma really does have the best state song.
P.P.S. The event took place at the National Cowboy & Western Heritage Museum, so enjoy a few photos from their exhibitions.
All my gals are brilliant.
I had the joy and honor to see my friend @profwiley debut her new book centered on Black women artists at the @zimmerliartmuseum
Her work on uncovering many unsung artists while centering her lessons on inquiry allowed for so many to be seen and placed in the light they deserve. Thank you for memorializing this important student driven exhibition. I loved that so many of your former students were there to see your collective work come to life.
On the first day we met, we knew we would be friends. She is my Soror 💕💚, was my co-worker, and was going to UVA 🧡💙. 👯♀️
Amber remains such a brilliant bright light in my life no matter which corner of the world she occupies.
Happy to be in the presence of a deep rooted brilliance that I remain in awe of. 🥂 And I was so surprised and honored to see my lil ole name in your work among giants. Thank you, my friend.
Happening this Wednesday, April 29 in New Brunswick, NJ.
And it’s official — we will have advance copies of Collective Yearning for sale. Come and get a signed copy!
In conjunction with the Zimmerli Art Museum’s exhibition, Allan Rohan Crite: Neighborhood, please join us for a discussion between Amber N. Wiley (Prof, U of Oklahoma and author of the forthcoming Collective Yearning: Black Women Artists from the Zimmerli Art Museum) and Diana Greenwald (William and Lia Poorvu Curator of the Collection, Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum).
FREE and open to the public.
Wednesday, April 29, 2026, 4:00 p.m.-6:00 p.m.
Zimmerli Art Museum
71 Hamilton St, New Brunswick, NJ, 08901
RSVP and parking info can be found here: tgers.edu/event/conspicuous-their-absence-curatorial-discussion-amber-n-wiley-and-diana-greenwald
Link also in bio.
Contact: [email protected]
If you anticipate needing any type of accommodation or have questions about the access provided, please call Nicole Simpson, Access Coordinator, at 848-932-6178 or email [email protected] in advance of your participation.
This event is co-sponsored by the Center for Women in the Arts at Douglass.
Detail: Allan Rohan Crite, “Harriet and Leon,” 1941. Oil on canvas. Boston Athenaeum, Gift of the artist, 1971. Courtesy of the Allan Rohan Crite Research Institute and Library. Tony Rinaldo Photography.
Yesterday was the one year anniversary of the publication of Model Schools in the Model City. So much can happen in a year. Like 8 public book events — OKC (x2), Norman, Tulsa, DC (x3), Atlanta — and 2 podcasts. Doing a virtual class visit at my alma mater GWU, where this research started. Having colleagues teaching my book this academic year. Selling out of all 500 copies of the hard cover… being selected as a finalist for two national book awards… reconnecting with friends and family near and far — including friends joining virtual events from abroad. I am loving this. Yall the real MVPs.
What will Year Two bring? More book events? Invite me to your town/university. You purchasing a paperback if you haven’t already copped that yet? Yeah… go ahead and do that.
Sundra Kaye (Wiley) Everly was many things — a daughter, a sister, a cousin, a mother, a grandmother, my auntie. A 1967 graduate of Muskogee Manual Training High School and later, Langston University.
On the morning of April 19, 1995, she showed up for her shift as an RN at St. Anthony’s Hospital in midtown OKC.
Sundra was a first responder after the explosion of the Murrah Building. She worked from 9:30 am to 10 pm in the effort to recover survivors until authorities said there were likely no more living victims trapped in the rubble. She is mentioned in an article from the front page of the New York Times the next day.
My auntie passed last August, and she is missed. But she will forever be my hero and I will shout her name from the mountain tops. Thinking of her today and all those whose lives were forever changed.
#weremember
Snapshots from the @natlmainstreet conference this week with some old and new peeps. It’s always a great time connecting with other placemakers,urbanists and community advocates. #placemaking #mainstreet #urbanism
Feeling good, feeling great. Got this email in my inbox today from @rutgersupress . Fine, fine, fine things on the horizon. My NJ peeps — I expect to see you soon! Friends all over — preorder your copy of Collective Yearning today, and get a 30% discount when you use the code RUP30 • Includes free shipping in the U.S.
