A Travel Through Time and the Art Department

The Southern University Visual Art Department has been around since the 1950s. The building where the department is housed now has been opened since 1960 as the Department of Fine Arts. This department has seen many notable teachers and students through its doors. Some of the professors who spent time teaching at this school include Jean-Paul Hubbard, Frank Hayden, Van Chambers, Albert Lavergne, and Harold Cureau. Several of these professors built great notoriety as Visual Arts and Educators with many of their students went on to become art teachers. 
When the Art Department first started, it came with a mission to continually be innovative in helping students to develop, creative and have analytical skills that are necessary for success in any field of study. The purpose of this department is to prepare students with a liberal arts education, to help them compete globally and to engage in advanced study in graduate and professional schools. 
The Fine Arts area is grounded in the idea that opportunity and quality can coexist in a diverse educational environment. When the students graduate to be conversant with historical and contemporary issues and procedures need to be ambitious in their fields and to contribute to the cultural environment of society.
Now the administration of the department is tied to the Mission Statement of the University and the Statement of Purpose. The Mission Statement, which was adopted by the Board of Supervisors on October 25, 2007, says “The mission of Southern University and A&M College, a Historically Black, 1890 Land-Grant Institution, is to provide opportunities for a diverse student population to achieve a high quality, global educational experience, to engage in scholarly research, and creative activities, which gives meaningful public service to the community, the state, the nation, and the world so that Southern University graduates are competent, informed and productive citizens.” 
According to the Statement of Purpose, the Department of Visual Arts main goal is to help students learn about who they are as a person, the skills they posse and how they utilize those skills in their careers and personal life. 
Professor Randell Henry, as a previous student of the Art Department, says “The Department of Fine Arts was granted Accredited Status by the National Association of Schools of Art (N.A.S.A.D.) in 2005, after Chairperson/Program Leader Martin Payton, other faculty members and myself spent more than four years working to build a top-level Department of Art for African American and other students in Louisiana.”
When the Art Department first started it would have a vast number of students graduating with a type of Arts major. During that time the school had from 40 to 60 majors and about 8 to 10 graduates yearly. 
After spending several years at the top, educating and producing high-quality graduates in art, the program was cut by the state. This was when the phasing out of so called “low enrollment and duplicated programs” at universities across the state of Louisiana began. Even though the art department no longer has the major, it still has the memories that so many previous students obtained when studying.
One of those past students, Mr. Nathaniel Landry, the teacher for the Understanding the Visual Arts and the Freehand Drawing class, says his experience of the Art Department during his time as a student was that  “What I got out of it the most was that I got a knowledge of self and a real acute understanding of the beauty of black people.”
Currently, the Art Department offers art as a minor where they mainly serve students through art electives. There may be a day when the Art Department once again has art as a major, but only time will tell. Until then, the Southern University Arts Department continues to teach and inspire creativity through the Visual Arts.

Gallery • 2 Photos

‘Rare Obtain Beauty in Neferetiti (ROBIN),” a 1997 Wade creation, was in the 11th Annual Homecoming Art Exhibition on October 31 in the Visual Arts Gallery. (Diamond Butler)