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historical notes
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Steve Turner established Steve Turner Fine Arts in Los Angeles in 1999, showcasing emerging and established artists, both local and international, with a focus on contemporary art, including painting, sculpture, video, and installation. A long list of talented artists—including Petra Cortright, Parker Ito, Eamon Ore-Giron, Joaquin Boz, Luciana Lamothe, Diedrick Brackens, Camilo Restrepo, Pablo Rasgado, Carlos Martiel, Rafael Rozendaal, Yung Jake, Hannah Epstein, George Rouy, Nick Doyle, Brittany Tucker, Jon Key and Kevin McNamee-Tweed-—have debuted at Turner’s galleries.
Turner has also been a strong advocate for diversity in the art world, featuring artists from underrepresented communities. He has amassed a significant personal collection of works by African American artists, spanning several decades and encompassing various styles and mediums. His collection includes works by well-known artists such as Kara Walker, Henry Taylor, and Glenn Ligon, as well as artists new to the scene like Devin B. Johnson and Derek Fordjour. In addition to this collection, he also assembled a groundbreaking collection of Black history, which boasts rare photographs, broadsides, pamphlets and manuscripts. Notable artifacts include a close-up photographic portrait of Harriet Tubman that captures her intense gaze, a previously unknown carte de visite of Frederick Douglass as well as his walking stick, the first cookbook written by an African American – "What Mrs. Fisher Knows About Old Southern Cooking" [published in San Francisco, 1881] – Black Panther material, and a broadside of President Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation printed in San Francisco in 1864. |
