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Dewey Crumpler (born 1949), is an American painter and educator. He taught at the San Francisco Art Institute (SFAI) for many years, where he held the title of associate professor.
Crumpler's work has been exhibited nationally and internationally, and is featured in the permanent collections of the Oakland museum of California; the Triton Museum of Art, Santa Clara, California; and the California African American Museum, Los Angeles. Crumpler has received a Flintridge Foundation award, National Endowment for the Arts fellowship grant, and the Fleishacker Foundation, fellowship eureka award. A digital image of his murals was included in the 2017 Tate Modern exhibition in London. Soul of a Nation: Art In the Age of Black Power, Tate Modern.
He was involved in Civil Rights activism and showed his work around the city, eventually meeting artist Emory Douglas of the Black Panther Party. Both he and Douglas were part of group of artists who met at Evangeline Montgomery's apartment.
Crumpler graduated with a BFA degree in 1972 from San Francisco Art Institute (SFAI); a MA in 1974 degree from San Francisco State University; and a MFA degree in 1989 from Mills College. He also studied mural painting in 1974 with Pablo O’Higgins and David Alfaro Siquieros in Mexico City.
Crumpler started teaching at SFAI in 1989 and was an associate professor of painting. One of his former students is Kehinde Wiley, known for painting Barack Obama's presidential portrait.
Crumpler first saw the mural when he was a Balboa High School student visiting George Washington High School for a football game. He was impressed with the scale of the piece, but initially disliked how the work portrayed African Americans and Native Americans. A few years later, when he was 18 or 19, he was chosen to paint a corresponding mural in response to student activists upset by the Arnautoff work. To prepare for designing the mural, Crumpler traveled to around the country for research, which he was able to do due to his father working for Pan American World Airways. Crumpler viewed different murals and spoke with muralist William Walker. He then went to Mexico and received guidance from artist Elizabeth Catlett. In Mexico, he also met artists Pablo O’Higgins and David Alfaro Siqueiros. After being mentored by O'Higgins, Crumpler came to see Arnautoff's murals as a critique of George Washington, rather than a celebration.
After going through multiple approval processes, Crumpler painted his mural Multi-Ethnic Heritage at the high school. It portrayed Latinos, Native Americans, Asian Americans and African Americans in empowering ways, and included historic figures like Cesar Chavez and Dolores Huerta. He spoke out against the San Francisco School Board's proposed destruction in 2019 of Arnautoff's murals.
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