What It's Like To Be the Only Black Art Commissioner in a City

Earlier this year, art historian Kilolo Luckett posted a prescient emotion to her Instagram page, which is usually filled with wondrous works of art from her frequent visits to museums around the world. Her March 22 post read: “It is exhausting being the only non-white art commissioner in this city.”

Little did she know that there was even more fatigue ahead for her. At that point she was entering into her eighth year serving on the city of Pittsburgh’s art commission, the body that approves or rejects proposals for public art projects on city grounds. It is also the body that has the authority to determine whether existing public arts projects need to come down, as it did last week when it voted to remove a controversial statue commemorating the 19th century, Pittsburgh-born musician Stephen Foster, who is considered the first professional songwriter in the U.S.