“One on One: Image & Response,” featuring selected works form the Paul R. Jones Collection of African American Art, is on view through March 23, in the galleries of Mechanical Hall.

“The life of a visual object is not completely contained in the image itself,” Amalia K. Amaki, curator of the Paul R. Jones Collection and UD professor of black American studies, said of the exhibition. “[It relies]
upon the ongoing dialogue that needs to exist between itself and those who willingly observe and respond to it.

“[This] and additional considerations of the visual interface between artist and audience have formed the basis for the exhibition, ‘One on One: Image and Response,’” Amaki said.

In keeping with this theme of artwork-viewer interaction, the exhibition, in addition to highlighting selected works from the Paul R. Jones Collection of African American Art, also features commentary on the works by 20 different writers who responded to what they saw.

“I remember the first time I saw a show of Mr. Polk’s photographs,” author Lillie Matthews Poindexter wrote, expressing her initial response to the work of selected artist Prentice Herman Polk. “My granddaughter dragged me along with her to that library over by the AUC. It was really something. I thought, this man (Polk) was good. He makes you want to own somebody else’s wedding picture...and a total stranger to boot!”

Responses to the works, because they were drawn from the same broad demographic of viewers who might typically take in a show, range from emotional, gut reactions to cooler musings that focus on historical and sociological aspects.

One of the writers, William Deering, assistant professor of art at UD and a contributor to The Paul R. Jones Collection, focused on the role art plays in shaping future generations.

“I decided to donate the photograph of Dr. [Martin Luther] King [by artist Ben Fernandez] to the collection after I pulled it from my files [...] to
discuss African-American history with my seven-year-old daughter,” Deering wrote. “I was having a discussion about Black History Month, and I told her that if she was going to listen to hip-hop and rap, she’s got to have a little history. This was part of that story. And it felt right. I thought it was appropriate that it should come to the Paul R. Jones Collection. It can be enjoyed by a lot of people. It has a good home.”

Still other responses, such as the one from Carole Marks, UD professor of sociology, commenting on a controversial screenprint titled “Spade” by artist David Hammons, focus on individual biographies.

“Hammons was born in 1943 in Springfield, Ill., in the heart of America’s heartland,” Marks wrote. “He once explained that ‘art was for him a way to keep from getting damaged from the outside world.’ Viewing [...] ‘Spade’ evokes to me W.E.B. Dubois’ concept of double-consciousness, ‘two warring ideals in one dark body’--what Hammons calls ‘a double negative, a double vision.’ It is an essence of the ‘Other’”

The complete text of the responses, along with reproductions of the selected works, is reproduced in the exhibition booklet.

Mechanical Hall gallery hours are from 11 a.m.-4 p.m., Tuesdays, Thursdays and Fridays; from 11 a.m.-8 p.m., Wednesdays; and from 1-4 p.m., Saturdays and Sundays. The gallery is closed on Mondays.