Recommended: The Black Presence in European Painting, with Michael Ohajuru

More and more, museums are working towards facilitating experiences that provide inclusive interpretations of their collections. One of the ways this is done is through themed tours, which can provide an insightful way of helping visitors connect with collections that many audiences often feel removed from. Cultural historian Michael Ohajuru runs one such tour called The Image of the Black in London Galleries. Through the tour, Michael explains the changing presence of black figures in European painting as a journey.

'At the start of the journey, I talk about the black [figure] as a subject or object of economic capital – a slave or a servant,' says Michael. 'By the end of the journey, they're creators of cultural capital. They're artists in their own right, creating an expression of themselves the times through their art.'

Michael breaks this evolution down further into two categories of works: ones with an explicit or implicit presence of black figures. We'll come back to what 'implicit' means, but let's first look at some explicit examples – that is to say, works of art that overtly (or explicitly) include black figures within them.

September 2022