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The Cleveland Museum of Art

Exploring “The Power of Music”

Tags for: Exploring “The Power of Music”
  • Tour
  • Ticket Required
Friday, April 18, 2025, 5:45–6:45 p.m.
Vivian Nicholson-Mueller, Educator, Historian, and Author
Location:  ATRM Atrium
Ames Family Atrium
Meet at the Information Desk in the atrium
Free; Ticket Required
Reserve Tickets

Speaker

  1. Vivian Nicholson-Mueller

    a woman sitting on the floor
     Vivian Nicholson-Mueller is an educator and historian who has done extensive research on the lives of White, Black, and Native people of precolonial, colonial, and postcolonial Long Island. Through her research and advocacy, Nicholson-Mueller, along with her cousin Simira Tobias, spearheaded a successful campaign to assign the Stony Brook, New York, Old Bethel Cemetery, which was established in the mid-19th century by free people of color, to the National and State and Registers of Historic Places. Nicholson-Mueller is descended from Native and Black people and European colonists who were among the early inhabitants and settlers of Setauket, Stony Brook, and Old Field, New York. 

About The Event

The Power of Music has long been an audience favorite at the Cleveland Museum of Art. Join us for this special gallery talk to learn the real-life story of Robin Mills, the Black man featured in the painting. American painter William Sydney Mount created vivid genre scenes of rural life on Long Island in the 1800s, often featuring laborers, people of color, and musicians. It is less commonly known that Mount’s paintings depicted real people who were part of the community and connected to the place that inspired his art. In this talk, Vivian Nicholson-Mueller, coauthor of The Art of William Sidney Mount: Long Island People of Color on Canvas and descendant of Mills, offers audiences insight into Mill’s life, her research process with coauthor Katherine Kirkpatrick, and the family lineage that connects this artwork to living descendants today. Space is limited, and a free ticket is required.

Sponsors

All education programs at the Cleveland Museum of Art are underwritten by the CMA Fund for Education. Principal support is provided by Dieter and Susan M. Kaesgen. Major annual support is provided by Brenda and Marshall Brown, David and Robin Gunning, Eva and Rudolf Linnebach, Gail C. and Elliott L. Schlang, Shurtape Technologies, and the Kelvin and Eleanor Smith Foundation. Generous annual support is provided by Gini and Randy Barbato, the M. E. and F. J. Callahan Foundation, Dr. William A. Chilcote Jr. and Dr. Barbara S. Kaplan, Char and Chuck Fowler, the Giant Eagle Foundation, Robin Heiser, the late Marta and the late Donald M. Jack Jr., Bill and Joyce Litzler, the Logsdon Family Fund for Education, Sarah Nash, Courtney and Michael Novak, William J. and Katherine T. O’Neill, the Pickering Foundation, William Roj and Mary Lynn Durham, Betty T. and David M. Schneider, the Sally and Larry Sears Fund for Education Endowment, Roy Smith, Paula and Eugene Stevens, the Trilling Family Foundation, Jack and Jeanette Walton, and the Womens Council of the Cleveland Museum of Art.

    The Cleveland Museum of Art is funded in part by residents of Cuyahoga County through a public grant from Cuyahoga Arts & Culture.

    Education programs are supported in part by the Ohio Arts Council, which receives support from the State of Ohio and the National Endowment for the Arts.