Black Spaces: Reclaim & Remain

Opening July 18 | Great Hall

July 18, 2025—Sunday, March 1, 2026

Black Spaces: Reclaim & Remain navigates the braided histories of displacement, resistance, and resilience within Black American communities in Oakland and the East Bay. Through new commissions in art, architecture, and archival research, the exhibition traces how these communities have creatively resisted dispossession and reimagined spaces of home and belonging.

Drawing inspiration from the legacies of West Oakland and Russell City, Black Spaces: Reclaim & Remain pulls from both OMCA’s permanent collection and loans from local repositories to trace the rise of these communities and their subsequent displacement. In response to this history, the exhibition presents three unique perspectives from an artist, Adrian Burrell; an architect, June Grant with blinkLAB architecture; and an archive, the Archive of Urban Futures and Moms 4 Housing. These installations reflect the ongoing struggle and success in reclaiming and reshaping self-determined spaces in the face of systemic violence, erasure, and urban renewal.

Developed in collaboration with East Bay residents affected by displacement, Black Spaces: Reclaim & Remain invites reflection on the intersection of activism, memory, and the materiality of home. It is a meditation on how Black American communities, in spite of ongoing systemic oppression, conjure wells of creativity and resistance that carve out places to hold their histories and futures.

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Highlights

[Map of West Oakland, 1968] Medium Courtesy of Segregation by Design
Adam P. Susaneck, Oakland: Freeways and Urban Renewal,  1968, Reproduction, Courtesy of Adam P. Susaneck, Segregation by Design
Michelle Vignes Kenny Playing Sax at the De Luxe Inn in Oakland 1983 Gelatin silver print OMCA
Michelle Vignes, Kenny Playing Sax at the De Luxe Inn in Oakland, 1983, Gelatin silver print, Dorothea Lange Award Purchase, Michelle Vignes photograph archive, © The Regents of the University of California, The Bancroft Library, University of California, Berkeley
Marion ColemanCountry Club NightsCirca 2015TextileHayward Area Historical Society
Marion Coleman, Country Club Nights, 2014, textile and mixed media, Courtesy of the Hayward Area Historical Society, gift of the Coleman-Jongewaard Family
Michelle Vignes, Having a Good Time at Eli Mile High Club in Oakland, 1983, Gelatin silver print, OMCA
Michelle Vignes,  Having a Good Time at Eli’s Mile High Club in Oakland, 1983, Gelatin silver print. Dorothea Lange Award Purchase, Michelle Vignes photograph archive, © The Regents of the University of California, The Bancroft Library, University of California, Berkeley
Marion Coleman Homes On Fire2014TextileHayward Area Historical Society
Marion Coleman,  Homes On Fire, 2014, Textile, Courtesy of the Hayward Area Historical Society, gift of Marion Coleman
Keith Dennison, Untitled [Sherman tank prepares to destroy homes for post office site], 1960, Gelatin silver print, The Oakland Tribune Collection, Oakland Museum of California, Gift of ANG Newspapers
Marion ColemanReunion: We Shall Always RememberCirca 2015TextileHayward Area Historical Society
Marion Coleman, Reunion: We Shall Always Remember, 2015, Textile and mixed media, Courtesy of the Hayward Area Historical Society, gift of Marion Coleman
[Children playing volleyball on a dirt playground at Russell School] Circa 1950 Gelatin silver print Courtesy of Hayward Area Historical Society
Untitled [Children playing volleyball at Russell School playground], 1950, Reproduction, courtesy of Hayward Area Historical Society
Untitled (Key system care running through Seventh Street) 1948Reproduction Courtesy of Western Railway Museum
Arthur Lloyd, Untitled [Key system car running through Seventh Street], 1948, Reproduction, courtesy of Western Railway Museum

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Sponsors

Major support for Black Spaces: Reclaim & Remain is provided by The Oakland Museum Women’s Board.

*Header image: Michelle Vignes, Having a Good Time at Eli Mile High Club in Oakland, 1983, Gelatin silver print, OMCA