12 December 2025

• 6:30 – 8:30 pm

• A talk as part of the Paul Mellon Lecture Series, 'Modern, Minimal, Practical, and Social: the Art of Rasheed Araeen' delivered by Courtney J. Martin

• National Gallery, London

In the autumn of 1982, Araeen was invited by the Wolverhampton Young Black Artists’ (WYBA) to the First National Black Art Convention to discuss the Form, Functioning and Future of Black Art. By the early 1980s, Araeen’s public discussions of Black art in London cast him as its founding practitioner. In that moment, his role in shaping the discourse of Black art was aided by younger artists of African, Asian and Caribbean descent. These artists realised Araeen’s conception of an avant-garde art that was both politically driven in content and materially distressed.

Timings
6.30pm–7.30pm: Lecture