00:00:09.140 - 00:00:22.040

When the gallery first opened three years ago, there were many who felt it would go the way of so many small galleries in San Francisco. Most of them enjoy a life of only a few months. But things have been different for the black man's gallery. It

00:00:22.040 - 00:00:45.740

enjoys a national reputation and for black artist African creators to determine their own destiny in black art. To determine aesthetically, ethically and artistically, what is black art to us as black people, and that the Black Man Art Gallery has put forth the creativity, the creative expression

00:00:45.860 - 00:01:03.890

of our black experience living in this white risk society you talk a great deal about relating to Africa. Do you think the people in this community relate to the art that is on display here? Yes, they do. Uh, the people in this community are not from

00:01:03.890 - 00:01:21.800

Europe. They are from Africa, so, therefore being Africans they can and have related to and identified with. Because the black experience is created into a visual form into paintings into sculptures, things that they have felt, things that they have lived and experienced in their community in

00:01:21.800 - 00:01:47.850

this city in this country. Yes, Black man's Art Gallery is an established viewpoint from which we have had and have grown and have established a cultural exchange between the different cultures of people. This is the first time in September of 1967 was the first time that

00:01:47.860 - 00:02:05.990

a black gallery owned by a black man there 12 artists who collectively display and market their works here. The youngest is a sculpture, 15 year old Nathaniel Service. He, like many of the other artists, have received some acclaim. An estimated 17,000 students have toured the gallery.

00:02:06.250 - 00:02:18.530

They've ranged from first graders to Stanford and Cal graduates. A third anniversary reception takes place at the gallery 6 19 Haight Street tonight. Velvet Davis for Eyewitness News, San Francisco.