Art Talk and the Uses of History

In a reading of Huey Copeland’s Bound to Appear: Art, Slavery, and the Site of Blackness in Multicultural America, Spillers examines the stakes and implications of the work against the broader perspective of black artistic practices in the sociopolitical context of the United States. Looking in detail at aspects of Copeland’s quartet of painters, she brings questions of aesthetics alongside present-day political concerns.