Shirley Fiterman Art Center Opening: William Majors: Making a Mark

The Shirley Fiterman Art Center at Borough of Manhattan Community College's (BMCC/CUNY) Fiterman Hall is pleased to announce William Majors: Making a Mark, the largest survey of Majors's art to date. The exhibit will open September 9 with a reception from 6 to 8 p.m. The show will continue through December 19. Throughout his short but vital career, William Majors (1930-1982) produced an innovative, varied body of work spanning paintings, prints, collages, and drawings. Self-taught as an anatomical draftsman while hospitalized as a teenager, Majors carried an early intimacy with the human body into an aesthetic language of biomorphic forms. This vocabulary was used across paintings and prints to explore the Old Testament, the natural world, and the fragility of life itself. Making a Mark reintroduces an artist whose accomplishments have long outpaced his public recognition. This exhibition pays particular attention to Majors's printmaking practice and the context that shaped it. On display in its entirety is Etchings from Ecclesiastes, a 1965 portfolio of eighteen etchings commissioned by the Museum of Modern Art's Junior Council--a rare honor for any printmaker, particularly one then working night shifts as a MoMA security guard. While developing this pivotal work, Majors was involved in Spiral, a collective of Black artists founded in 1963 against the backdrop of the Civil Rights Movement. The Shirley Fiterman Art Center, located at 81 Barclay Street, is open Wednesday through Friday from 12-5 p.m. and by appointment. To schedule an appointment outside of operating hours please contact [email protected].