Collections from 5 HBCUs featured in National Museum of African American History & Culture exhibition

On view at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of African American History and Culture is At the Vanguard: Making and Saving History at HBCUs, an exhibition built from the collections of five historically Black colleges and universities. It brings HBCU museums and archives to the center of the story, framing them as cultural infrastructure that has shaped what survives, what gets studied, and what becomes visible in public memory.

The exhibition draws from Clark Atlanta University, Florida A&M University, Jackson State University, Texas Southern University, and Tuskegee University. Presented at NMAAHC from January 16 through July 19, 2026, the show brings together more than 100 objects that trace artistry, innovation, campus life, and activism across generations.

Five HBCUs, one argument

At the Vanguard makes a clear point: HBCUs have documented and preserved African American history for more than a century, often filling gaps left by other collecting institutions. Nearly two-thirds of HBCUs house museums, art galleries, or archives, and this exhibition treats that fact as a blueprint for how Black history has been protected and passed forward.

Instead of presenting archives as quiet storage, the exhibition treats them as active sites of care, decision-making, and cultural power. What gets collected, cataloged, conserved, and taught becomes part of the record. What goes missing shapes the record, too. This show focuses on the institutions that have kept the evidence close.

What you will see

The objects span art, literature, science, and photography, creating a portrait of HBCUs as makers of history and keepers of it.

• First editions of Margaret Walker’s Jubilee and For My People, presented as literary artifacts that carry cultural weight beyond the page.
• Tuskegee Institute pottery that spotlights student craftsmanship and training in the decorative arts.
• Early scientific journals from Tuskegee researchers that point to the institution’s legacy in agricultural and medical sciences.
• Archival photographs by HBCU-trained and staff photographers including Doris Derby, Chester Higgins, Earlie Hudnall Jr., and P.H. Polk, documenting campus life, student activism, and broader cultural movements.
• Artwork collected by HBCUs, including works by John Biggers, Elizabeth Catlett, Robert Pruitt, and Renee Stout.
• One of the few known color videos of George Washington Carver, connecting Tuskegee’s history to a rare moving-image record.

Why this matters right now

If you care about Black art history, the archive is not a side character. It is the mechanism that decides what can be researched, exhibited, and cited. At the Vanguard puts that mechanism in view. It shows how HBCUs have held onto materials that track excellence across disciplines, including the everyday textures of student life and the public stakes of activism.

It also clarifies a practical lesson for artists and cultural workers: legacy follows documentation. The work matters, and the record matters. Collections shape who gets revisited, who gets contextualized, and who becomes teachable to future audiences.

At the Vanguard is on view at the National Museum of African American History and Culture from January 16 to July 19, 2026. Free timed-entry passes are required.