Tobias Wofford
Assistant Professor, Department of Art and Art History
Santa Clara University, 500 El Camino Real, Santa Clara, CA 95053
phone: 408-551-3349 fax: 408-554-4809 email: [email protected]
Education
Ph.D. University of California, Los Angeles
Art History (2011)
Major Subjects: African American Art
Minor Subjects: Contemporary Art, African Art
Dissertation: Africa as Muse: The Visualization of Diaspora
in African American Art, 1950-1980
M.A. University of California, Los Angeles
Art History (2005)
Thesis: Memory Beyond History: The Art of Georges Adeagbo
B.A. San Francisco State University
Art
(2003)
Magna Cum Laude
University of Amsterdam
(2002)
International School of the Humanities and Social Sciences
Bilateral Exchange Program
Major Areas of Research
Art of the African Diaspora, African Art, African American Art
Teaching Experience
2012-present
Santa Clara University: Assistant Professor
Courses: Exhibiting the Global, African Art, African
American art, Art of the African Diaspora, Curating
Contemporary Art
2015
Winter
Stanford University: Visiting Assistant Professor
Course: Art of the African Diaspora
2010-2012
Johns Hopkins University: Postdoctoral Fellow
Courses: Exhibiting the Global; Introduction to the Art of the
African Diaspora; African American Art
2008
Summer
California State University San Bernardino: Lecturer
Course: Art of Asia, Africa and the Americas
2008
Spring
California State University Long Beach: Lecturer
Courses: Introduction to the Art of Africa;
The Arts of Africa, Oceania, and Native North America
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2007-2008
Academic Year
Otis College of Art and Design: Instructor
Courses: Introduction to Visual Culture
African Art
2007
Spring
Oxnard Community College: Instructor
Course: Art 101: Art Appreciation
2006-2007
Academic Year
UCLA Art History Department: Teaching Associate
Courses: Modern art, (fall and winter quarters)
Introduction to the Arts of Africa
2005-2006
Academic Year
UCLA Art History Department: Teaching Assistant
Courses: Ancient art
Modern art
Introduction to the Arts of Africa
Publications
(Forthcoming) “Whose Diaspora?” Art Journal (Spring 2016)
(Forthcoming) “Review of Aesthetic of the Cool: Afro Atlantic Art and Culture.” African
Arts
“Reconsidering Black Internationalism.” in Melvin Edwards: Five Decades (Dallas:
Nasher Sculpture Center, 2015), 60-71.
“First World Festival of Negro Arts.” Grove Art Online. (New York: Oxford University
Press, July 2014). http://www.oxfordartonline.com/subscriber/article/grove/art/T2263706
“Second World Black and African Festival of Arts and Culture (FESTAC 1977).” Grove
Art Online. (New York: Oxford University Press, July 2014).
http://www.oxfordartonline.com/subscriber/article/grove/art/T2263793
“Cullen Washington Jr.: Another Dimension.” in Fore (New York: The Studio Museum
in Harlem, 2012).
“Can You Dig It?: Signifying Race in David Hammons’ Spade Series.” in LA Object &
David Hammons Body Prints. ed. Lindsay Charlwood (New York: Tilton Gallery, 2011),
86-135.
“Facing History through the Art of Georges Adeagbo.” Chicago Art Journal 19 (fall,
2009) 65-78.
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“Exhibiting a Global Blackness: The First World Festival of Negro Arts,” in New World
Coming: The Sixties and the Shaping of Global Consciousness, eds. Karen Dubinsky et
al. (Toronto: Between the Lines Press, 2009), 179-186.
Presentations and Symposia
April 24
2015
“Ritual and Spiritual Power: A Turn to African Aesthetics in African
American Art” Presented at “Concepts of Diaspora” Conference at Johns
Hopkins University
December 11 “The Enduring Flash: Robert Farris Thompson and Contemporary
2014
African American Art” Presented at “Thirty Years of Meaning and
Influence - Flash of the Spirit by Robert Farris Thompson”
Conference organized by Prospect New Orleans and the Ogden
Museum of Southern Art
October 4-5
2013
“Feedback: Between American Art and African Art History” Presented at
“American Art in dialogue with Africa and its Diaspora” Symposium
organized by the Smithsonian American Art Museum
June 28
2013
“Afro-futures: Africa and the Black Arts Movement” Presented at
“Revolution 3.0: iconographies of utopia in Africa and its diaspora” Panel
5th European Conference on African Studies, Lisbon, 2013
June 26
2013
Discussant: Beyreuth Academy of Advanced African Studies Workshop:
“Doing Things with Images,” Goethe Institut Portugal
February 23
2012
“Diaspora and Diversity” Presented in the “Transcending Compliance
Models: Diversity in Theory and Practice” panel CAA Annual Conference
November 12 “Framing Culture/Displaying Race: Traditional and Contemporary Art in
2011
The First World Festival of Negro Arts” Presented at “Curating Race,
Curating Space” Symposium, University of Michigan.
October 21
2011
Organizer and panelist, “Nobody Knew Me: Ambivalent Returns in
African American Art” Presented in the “Diasporic Trajectories & Sited
Encounters” panel at Johns Hopkins University.
October 20
2011
Co-organizer and panelist, “African Roots and Diasporic Returns in
FESTAC’77 and Jeff Donaldson’s Majority” Presented in the “Views from
the Diaspora: Visual Culture and Troubled Returns” panel at the American
Studies Association Annual Conference, 2011
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November
2010
“Can You Dig It? Blackness and Meaning in the Art of David Hammons”
Invited lecture at History of Art Graduate Student Lecture Series, Johns
Hopkins University
February 25
2010
“A Trans-African Art: Jeff Donaldson’s Africa and the Black Arts
Movement” Lecture at the Center for Advanced Study in the Visual Arts
February
2010
“What is Africa to Me?: African American Art and the Problem of Origins”
Presented in the “African Diaspora Art History: State of the Field” panel
CAA Annual Conference, 2010
December 12 “Coming to America.” Presented at “Locating Yinka Shonibare MBE”
2009
Symposium held at the National Museum of African Art, Washington,
D.C.
March 7-8
2008
“Back to the Crossroads: Kongo Art and the Articulation of Diaspora in
the United States.” Presented at: “New Critical Perspectives in African
American Art History” conference at the University of Maryland, College
Park
June 24
2007
Discussant, “Film Screenings” for Lasting Foundations: The Art of
Architecture in Africa exhibition at the California African American
Museum, Los Angeles
June 13-16
2007
“(Re)Defining the Black World: A look at The First World Festival of
Negro Arts.” Presented at: “New World Coming: The Sixties and the
Shaping of Global Consciousness” conference at Queen’s University,
Kinston Ontario
March 30April 1
2006
“Can You Dig It: Signifying Race through Art in David Hammons’ Spade
Series.” Presented at: “Variations on Blackness” conference at Indiana
University, Bloomington.
Curated Exhibitions
Sept.2014Feb, 2015
Interrupting Entropy: Selections from the Betlach Collection,
(Project Director: the student-curated exhibition is the result of a spring
2014 course, “Curating Contemporary Art”), catalog, The Third Floor
Gallery, Orradre Library, Santa Clara University.
Grants/ Awards/ Fellowships
2015
Terra Foundation Postdoctoral Fellowship in American Art, Smithsonian
American Art Museum, Washington, D.C.
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2010-12
Andrew W. Mellon Postdoctoral Fellow, The Johns Hopkins University
2008-10:
Wyeth Fellow, Center for Advanced Study in the Visual Arts, National
Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.
2008:
Honorable Mention, Ford Foundation Dissertation Fellowship, National
Research Council of the National Academies
2007:
Edward A. Dickson History of Art Fellowship, University of California,
Los Angeles
2005
Graduate Summer Research Mentorship, University of California, Los
Angeles
2003-04:
Eugene Cota Robles Fellowship, University of California, Los Angeles
2003:
W. Burghardt Turner Fellowship, Stony Brook University (declined)
Service and other experience
June
2015
Discussant, “Community Voices: A Public Dialogue with Tobias Wofford,”
event held in conjunction with the exhibition Portraits and Other Likenesses
from the SFMOMA Collection at the Museum of the African Diaspora in San
Francisco
2013
Panel Member/Juror: San Mateo County Arts Grants Program
20072008
Research Assistant: Getty Research Institute, Scholar Program
Fall
2006
Organizing Committee: 41st Annual UCLA Art History Graduate Student
Symposium: On Love
20042006
Editor: Visualink; UCLA AHGSA online journal
2005
Graduate Student Intern: The Broad Art Foundation
2002
Education Intern: De Young Center for the Arts, Museum Ambassador’s
Program
2001
Gallery Assistant: Art Gallery; Cesar Chavez Student Center
2001
Co-Founder and Co-Director: The Artery Student Gallery; SFSU
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