From the horrors of the slave trade to the struggle for equality and justice, stories about race are among the central narratives of American culture from its beginning to the present. No significant historic era in this nation has gone untouched by the oppression of racism or the African American community’s struggle for dignity. It follows, then, that the extraordinary collection of American historical materials at the Rosenbach Museum & Library would include abundant evidence of the African American experience.

The first major exhibition at this museum to engage this subject, Look Again attempts not to display merely a category of “African American collections” but, instead, to re-examine all of its American historical collections. By inviting you to join us in re-looking at and re-thinking the books, manuscripts, and fine and decorative arts in the collection through the lens of the African American historical experience, we ask you to explore African American history as inseparable from American history.

All of the materials in this exhibition belong to the Rosenbach’s permanent collections; most were collected by the Rosenbach brothers, the institution’s founders. As part of its active acquisitions program, the Rosenbach continues to collect objects that shed light on African American history, and several recent acquisitions appear in this exhibition. This project also includes a series of special tours that reinterpret the Rosenbach’s historic house through the lens of African American history.

It is our hope that this project will encourage you to look again at American culture on a larger scale and witness African American history as an inextricable part of our mutual American past. Look again – the profound presence of the African American historical experience is everywhere!

Project Team:

Bill Adair
Greg Giuliano
Judith Guston
Katherine Haas

Diane Turner, Ph.D., consulting curator

The exhibition and related programs are generously supported by the Christian R. and Mary F. Lindback Foundation, the Connelly Foundation, the Greater Philadelphia Tourism Marketing Corporation, the Heritage Philadelphia Program funded by The Pew Charitable Trusts and administered by the University of the Arts, the Hirsig Family Fund of the Philadelphia Foundation, the Lincoln Financial Group Foundation, the Pennsylvania Humanities Council, Philadelphia Media Holdings L.L.C., the Samuel S. Fels Fund, the Stockton Rush Bartol Foundation, and the trustees and friends of the Rosenbach Museum & Library.