Draft:Rhinold Ponder

Ponder was born in 1959 in Chicago, Illinois. He was the son of a preacher, Alvin F Ponder, born in Quitman, Georgia and Carrie B. Ponder ^[5], from Port Gibson Mississippi, who worked at Spiegel’s in accounts payable and later for the Midwest Women’s Center as well as the Executive Director of the Chicago Youth Center. Carrie was recognized by multiple Chicago and national papers, such as the Chicago Tribune, Chicago Sun Times, National Enquirer, and USA Today for guiding eight of her kids to prestigious colleges as a low-income single mom who overcame multiple adversities, including poverty and homelessness ^{[6] [7] [8] [9] [10]}. Rhinold and his seven younger siblings, who attended prestigious colleges such as Princeton, the University of Pennsylvania and the University of Chicago, were featured in these stories, which were shared on multiple media shows, including the Oprah Winfrey, the Jenny Jones shows, and the CBS Morning News.

As a child, Ponder won a prize for his poetry at an OBAC writer’s workshop poetry competition judged by Gwendolyn Brooks and an honorable mention for a national Hallmark-sponsored art competition while attending Dunbar Vocational High School on Chicago’s South Side ^[11]. At Dunbar, Rhinold majored in Commercial Art and was instructed by one of the founders of Afri-Cobra, Sherman Beck.

He graduated from Princeton University in 1981^[12]. He majored in politics and studied creative writing with Pulitzer Prize-winning poet Stanley Kunitz. At graduation, he was recognized for his leadership and contribution to campus life when he was awarded the Frederick Douglass Service Award.^[13]

While attending New York University School of Law, Ponder served as editor-in-chief of the NYU Review of Law and Social Change. Ponder was the first African American to manage an NYU law review. After working for three decades as a lawyer, specializing in bankruptcy, real estate and employment law, Ponder reconnected with his art. In the summer of 2019, Ponder served an Artist Residency in Kigamboni, Tanzania, studying under notable feminist Makonde sculptor Mwandale “Big Mama” Mwanyekwa^[14].

In 2020, he founded Art Against Racism and, in collaboration with artist and writer Judith Brodsky and Rutgers University, presented the multimedia virtual exhibition and live-streamed show, Memorial Monument, Movement in recognition of the art created in response to the extrajudicial killings of Blacks, such as Brianna Taylor, George Floyd and Ahmaud Arbery, during the pandemic. ^[15] He curates several exhibitions, such as Manifesting Beloved Community at the West Windsor Arts Council in West Windsor, New Jersey.

Ponder is married to non-profit executive Michele Tuck-Ponder ^[16]. She is also the former Mayor of Princeton Township. The couple has two children. One of them, Jamaica Ponder, is a former journalist at CBS News Chicago and the founder of Ponder Creative Consulting, a social media and film production company. Their son, William Ponder, is a student at Howard University.

Ponder’s artwork is a complex meditation about systemic racism and American culture. ^[17] He explores the importance of labels, icons, history and language, such as his proclaimed work “The Rise and Fall of the N-word,” in which he featured 33 - 37 multimedia and acrylic paintings, mostly done by Ponder himself, accompanied by some commissioned work, including a series of “N-Word Logos.” His exhibition was called “an exquisite, grotesque, moving case for reparations”. One of the paintings in it, “Strange Fruit: High Tech Lynching or Suicide?” which features cut-outs of Michael Jackson, O.J. Simpson, and Clarence Thomas hanging from a tree branch with televisions as their heads, with the body of a lynched man hanging from the opposite branch, caused controversy. Ponder’s daughter, Jamaica, submitted a photo of her and her friends for her high school’s yearbook with the aforementioned painting in the background as well as a piece by Rhinold called “N-Rich”^[18][19]. Though they were partially covered by one of her friends, she was suspended for a day, leading to students protesting the punishment which many felt was in retaliation for her international recognition as an highly publicized upstander against antisemitism associated with her high school classmates.

Other artwork by Ponder includes his series “And Still We Thrive,”^[20] which consists of multiple abstract paintings that symbolically represent “the challenges and joys of being Black at Princeton.”^[21]

Ponder has also curated multiple exhibitions, such as “Retrieving James Wilson Edwards and a Forgotten Circle of Black Artists,” co-curated with Judith Brodsky and displayed at Princeton Arts Council.

Through Art Against Racism, he has also curated multiple exhibitions including “Memorial Monument Movement”^[22] which was a virtual exhibition responding to the George Floyd protests. The exhibition is notable as the one of two exhibitions to collect and archive communal and individual art created throughout the world during the pandemic and Black Lives Matter protests. Through AAR, he also co-sponsored, with the West Windsor Arts Council of West Windsor, New Jersey, “Manifesting Beloved Community” which visualizes Dr. Martin Luther King’s vision of a world where communities cared for each other’s well-being and the well-being of the planet and “Earth Song Refrain: BIPOC Artists on Climate and Environment” which centered the work of Black and brown visual artists and poets on environmental racism and climate change.

Ponder is also the co-author or co-editor of the several publications: Retrieving the Life and Art of James Wilson Edwards and a Circle of Black Artists: Rex Goreleigh, Hughie Lee-Smith, Selma Hortense Burke & Wendell T. Brooks, Wisdom of the Word Love: Great African-American Sermons, Wisdom of the Word Faith: Great African-American Sermons. ^{[23][24] [25]}

At New York University School of Law in 1985–86, Ponder served as editor-in-chief of The Review of Law and Social Change, becoming the first African American to lead a major law review at NYU.