by Rowan Johnson
SOU Class of 2025, Creative Writing

Michelle Grabner, Untitled, 2022, walnut, bronze, and jam jar lids, courtesy of the artist

The process of preserving fruit has been around since the Stone Age but wasn’t written and recorded until the Romans. Originally stored in honey, jam was often seen as a delicacy because of its time-consuming production. When sugar became the main preservative, it became a status symbol in Europe because of how expensive sugar was. The industrial revolution made jam more accessible to the public through standardized canning techniques and mass production, but it wasn’t until World War II that the topping became a staple of the American breakfast. The long shelf life and convenience of preserved foods helped both domestically and abroad during rations. Today, it is seen as a place to experiment with flavor profiles and is mostly a culinary tool so ingrained that it’s easy to overlook. Artist Michelle Grabner plays with the long lineage of food security, manufacturing, and commercialization with her collection of work featuring jam jar lids mounted into walnut wood. Each lid is a little bit different. Some are worn and rusted while others are brand new and sporting recognizable logos and brand names. Their arrangement on the board is reminiscent of a night sky of stars or a picnic spread. Learn more about the culinary history of jam with the link below, and find Michelle Grabner’s jam lid pieces in the Main Gallery of the Schneider Museum of Art. 

 

https://www.zozosjams.com/blogs/2023/june/the-history-of-jam/

American painter and portraitist Amy Sherald uses her work to intimately document contemporary Black America. In 2016, she became the first woman and the first African-American woman to win the National Portrait Gallery’s Outwin Boochever portrait competition (a Smithsonian Museum competition held every three years that highlights excellence in portraiture). In 2017, she and Kehinde Wiley were selected by former U.S. president and First Lady Barack and Michelle Obama to paint their White House portrait. Her work integrates Black bodies into the Western art canon through the appropriation of iconic images and fully embodied representation. Her piece For Love, and for Country takes the iconic D-Day kiss and reimagines it with two Queer Black men. During a time of rising anti-LGBTQ+ legislation, Sherald’s work demands recognition and the placement of Black Queerness in history.

As of yesterday (7/23/25), Sherald has withdrawn her exhibition "American Sublime" from the Smithsonian Museum citing censorship from the Trump administration. As a federally funded institution, the Smithsonian has begun the process of dismantling its diversity offices. It has also been under direct fire from the administration, cited as being "divisive" and "fostering a sense of national shame." Sherald reports being told by the National Portrait Gallery that she may have to remove a painting of a transgender Statue of Liberty to pacify right-wing politicians. She instead chose to withdraw her exhibition. Censorship against artists, specifically artists of minority groups, will continue to be attacked, but we have the opportunity to support these artists outside of mainstream institutions. 

Learn more about Amy Sherald and For Love, and for Country with the link below, and see the piece in person in the Entry Gallery of the Schneider Museum of Art. 

https://www.cnn.com/style/article/amy-sherald-vj-day-kiss-alfred-eisenstaedt-snap