Faith Ringgold: Full Circle
The Teachings and Her Legacy
February 28 - May 2, 2026
Opening Celebration: Saturday, February 28, 6-8 pm
Curated by Mashonda Tifrere
Spanning nearly five decades of artistic production, Full Circle—The Teachings and Her Legacy is a comprehensive examination of Faith Ringgold’s multidisciplinary practice. The exhibition brings together works created between 1976 and 2023, tracing the artist’s evolution across painting, textile art, and narrative assemblage. Born in Harlem in 1930, Ringgold emerged from the Black Arts Movement and became a pioneering voice in American art through her integration of autobiography, social and political activism, and techniques traditionally associated with women’s craft.
The exhibition is framed conceptually through Ringgold’s relationship to UC San Diego, where she served as professor of visual arts from 1984 to 2002. This institutional affiliation provides a lens for understanding how her academic philosophy materialized throughout her practice and impacted not only those she mentored at UC San Diego, but generations of artists around the world. Ringgold’s curriculum was centered on identity and social history, encouraging students to incorporate their own personal narratives into their work. During her years in California, Ringgold also produced her beaded face masks and California Dah paintings (1983), works that juxtapose the nostalgia of her New York roots with the creative energy of her West Coast experience.
The curatorial layout moves chronologically, grouping works around recurring themes in Ringgold’s practice: the reclamation of historical narrative, the centering of Black women’s experiences, and the elevation of quilting as a fine art methodology. Over decades, Ringgold organically developed the technique of her story quilts—hybrid works combining painted canvas, quilted fabric, and written text—to challenge hierarchies between craft and high art.
Works such as Dancing at the Louvre (2023) and the Coming to Jones Road series (1999) demonstrate Ringgold’s commitment to placing Black subjects in spaces from which they have long been excluded. The politically explicit works All Power to the People (2023) and Committee to Defend the Panthers (2023) reflect her alignment with Black liberation movements of the 1960s and 70s, and a self-portrait completed in 2023, Ringgold’s final year of life, offers a meditation on legacy and artistic endurance.
Full Circle—The Teachings and Her Legacy invites viewers into a practice where personal narrative, collective memory, and formal innovation intertwine, offering insight into an artist who fundamentally reshaped the possibilities of American art, and whose focus on the inseparability of aesthetics and political consciousness continues to resonate within contemporary art discourse.
Image: Faith Ringgold, Dancing on the George Washington Bridge II, 2020. © 2026 Anyone Can Fly Foundation / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York
Mashonda Tifrere Biography
Mashonda Tifrere is an international curator, collector, author and advocate whose two‑decade career bridges music, art, and philanthropy. Her practice integrates creativity, wellness, and cultural leadership.
Mashonda began her publishing career in 1999, when she was signed as a songwriter with Warner Chappell Music and subsequently tapped to write songs for a variety of influential musical artists. She landed her first record deal as an artist with Columbia Records in the early 2000s, and released her debut album in 2005.
As she segued into fine arts, Mashonda graduated from the Christie’s Education Art Business program in 2016, the same year she founded ArtLeadHer and in 2021 she launched Art Genesis, two transformative platforms that champion artists at every stage, with a particular focus on women and emerging voices. She followed this with her 2018 debut parenting book Blend: The Secret to Co‑Parenting and Creating a Balanced Family, published by Penguin Random House.
As a curator and advocate for visual artists, Mashonda has presented work by over 250 artists across museums, galleries, brand collaborations and art fairs worldwide. She has worked with institutions including the Whitney Museum, Pérez Art Museum Miami (PAMM), Sotheby’s, and Christie’s London. In 2024, she received the Art + Soul Award from Franklin Simmons and the Pérez Art Museum Miami for her curatorial and advocacy work. In 2025, Tifrere wrote and recorded a mindfulness-focused audio tour of the renowned Stuart Collection at the University of California San Diego. Her work has been featured in Forbes, The New York Times, Cultured, Artnet, Whitewall, and Artsy.