This is Steven Nelson. In the late 90’s I took his art history class at Tufts/The Museum School, in Boston. The focus was African American Art. The first day of his first class he said “It is all about hair.” Like @solangeknowles #DontTouchMyHair Hair. He changed my life. I didn’t learn about Hammons, or Gillam or Riboud until much later. I knew the work of both Walkers and the women who lived and made art in Clinton Hill, Brooklyn, but Professor Nelson changed me. Jane Fonda had given me the book she helped make #SoulsGrownDeep after I spent 96’-97’ mostly with Nilots in Kenya and Tanzania with @olereiyia hoping he could end FGM in East Africa, and began to understand the art of Americans who were black. I got the literature and “outsider” work. I had read all of Morrison and everything she read. But this one sentence changed my entire perspective on the experience of my browner fellows and the petty, evil shit they had to deal with here at home. They dealt with a shallow, petty power grab with such incomparable power and grace through the arts, it made me proud to be American. What was being discussed, really, in American ART. Black Art. @studiomuseum art. One sentence from this brilliant man, opened the door to a world I needed. He is the new dean of #CASVA He is at The National Gallery, where we all get to benefit from his incredible wealth of knowledge and insight. Here he is with his handsome partner, smiling! I would like to thank him. Thank you to all people who take the time to teach. You really do change the world. Every damned day. 🙏🏽 Deep bow, Prof. Deep MF bow, sir. And some love... YMB dpetermanus @snelsonus