Berkeley Unified

Banner image features "Black Joy" by artist Thaddeus Coates aka Hippy Potter

These resources are intended to help students and families prepare for participation in Berkeley Unified's Oratorical Festival. This year's Oratorical theme is "Black Artists: Art for Change. Art for Joy." For even more resources, please contact your teacher or school librarian.

This year’s Black History Oratorical Festival (BHOF) theme, Black Artists, aligns the BUSD competition with the national theme for Black History Month.

From the National Museum of African American History and Culture:

"African American artists -- poets, writers, visual artists, and dancers -- have historically served as change agents through their crafts. Drawn from their ancestors’ ancient rites of passage and the shared hopes of liberty, Black artists continue to fuse the rhythmic cadence of creative expressions with the pulsating beats of progress."

From the Association for the Study of African American Life and History (ASALH):

"African American art is infused with African, Caribbean, and the Black American lived experiences. In the fields of visual and performing arts, literature, fashion, folklore, language, film, music, architecture, culinary and other forms of cultural expression, the African American influences have been paramount. African American artists have used art to preserve history and community memory as well as for empowerment. Artistic and cultural movements such as the New Negro, Black Arts, Black Renaissance, hip-hop, and Afrofuturism, have been led by people of African descent and set the standard for popular trends around the world."

Let Black artists inspire you to create an original piece or select a published piece speaking to the impact of Black arts.

Resources on “Black Artists”

• Performance Idea: Read a Pulitzer Prize winning piece by a Black writer and either perform an excerpt or create an original piece that reflects this artist’s impact.

  • Fiction, Poetry and Drama Winners To Read This Black History Month - The Pulitzer Prizes

• Performance Idea: Perform a poem from a Black writer, like the ones below, that speaks to the importance of art for change or joy.

  • ART IV: Remembering Gwendolyn Brooks by Haki R.… | Poetry Magazine

  • Letter to Brooks: Spring Garden by Major Jackson | Poetry Magazine

  • Occasional Poem by Jacqueline Woodson | Poetry Foundation

  • The Weary Blues by Langston Hughes | Poetry Foundation

• Performance Idea: Study a piece of visual or performing art by a Black Artist, like the ones below, and create an original response to the impact of the art.

  • National Gallery of Art: Black Art & Artists in Our Collection

  •  All Music Is Black Music | National Museum of African American History and Culture

  • National Museum of African American Music 

  • Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater: Chroma, Grace, Takademe, Revelations (2015)

  • Smithsonian Museum: African American Art in the 20th Century  

  • Old Roots, New Leaves | Museum of the African Diaspora

  • 15 Pioneering Black Architects Who Shaped America