‘Couple in Raccoon Coats’ by James Van Der Zee at Riverside Church on February 10, 2012. Photo Credit ; Rahav Iggy Segev / Photopass.com (Rahav Segev / Photopass.com)
While Fashion Week is all the rage on the Upper West Side right now, Black History Month is being celebrated in style a bit farther uptown with the third annual Harlem Fine Arts Show today and tomorrow at Riverside Church.
Work by more than 100 artists from all over the world is on display — from Haiti, Brazil, Jamaica, Ghana, France and elsewhere.
“We went from 2,000 people [attending] to 10,000 people last year, and we’re expecting 20,000 this year,” says the show’s founder, Dion Clarke.
Saying the exhibition represents “a new Harlem Renaissance,” Clarke adds that the art show puts young people in Harlem in touch with African-American history by mixing works by up-and-coming artists and pieces by established ones.
“That’s what we call cultural nutrition,” he says.
While far-flung artists are represented, it’s Harlem’s own James Van Der Zee, the late photographer, whose work is one of the highlights. His widow, Donna Van Der Zee, says celebs such as Spike Lee and Bill Cosby are fans of her husband’s work, which documents the first Harlem Renaissance and includes portraits of historical figures ranging from Marcus Garvey to Muhammad Ali to America’s first black female millionaire, Madam C.J. Walker.
Van Der Zee was shy, says his widow. “He’d call himself Bashful Jim,” and he didn’t like crowds, she recalls.
But he’d probably be happy with the Harlem crowd appreciating his work and that of other artists.
“As the kids say, it’s going to be a funky time,” says Clarke.
Harlem Fine Arts Show: $20 admission (free for uniformed armed forces members); today, 10 a.m to 8 p.m, tomorrow, 12:30 to 7 p.m., at Riverside Church, 490 Riverside Drive, at 120th Street; 914-980-4427, hfas.org