“Why does Saginaw deserve a Black Museum?” Kevin Jones asks on the museum’s website.
He has rendered the name “AMusBE” as shorthand in pursuit of a permanent “museum of the Black experience” in his hometown.
“Deserve,” where most would say “need,” reflects his positive determination to showcase the truth.
His reason is similarly succinct: “It’s simply a matter of equity and justice.”
Jones recently acquired a building for the new museum with plenty of space for other donors to complement his own collection of artifacts, which he steadily has gathered from family and friends, along with from auctions, flea markets, even rummage sales.
His personal collection has surpassed more than 6,000 items, from dolls and posters to salt shakers, which will be grouped in exhibits once the museum opens.
His passion for collecting and for history comes from his grandmother, Lula Bell Hardy, who passed away three years ago at age 98.
Kevin’s career is in social work, and he spent most of his young adult years at various stops along the East Coast. Upon his return home, he emerged last year with a rental of open space for “Blactiquing” at the former Case Funeral Home near the courthouse. He also gained fans and followers with “The Black Hand Side” at the Saginaw Art Museum.
African American artifacts reflect historical highlights and low points, the same as in overall history.
“The Black Hand Side is an interactive art installation that peeks through the prism of race to explore American history and experiences from American descendants of slavery,” Jones writes. “The reclaimed treasures acquired from antique shops range from the most celebratory dedications of Black people to the most vile and grotesque.”
Kevin closes with his description for why Saginaw “deserves” AMusBE.
“To simply observe these historic testaments as whimsical or intriguing art, the viewer turns a blind eye to real and enduring atrocities,” he notes. “Yet, in choosing to look at its Black hand side, lessons of resiliency, triumph, joy, and determination – in spite of challenges and injustices – become clear. We try to tell the whole story.”
AMusBE will also display pieces from local artists including Nyesha Clark-Young, DeVaughn Collins, Trel Frazier, Corrin Grooms, Antaios Hayes, Patrick Hayes, and other Michigan-based artists, creators, and collectors.
