Kansas University’s Spencer Museum of Art has received $100,000 for an exhibit of the work of Aaron Douglas, considered by some to be the father of African-American art.

KU received the grant from the Henry Luce Foundation to support the exhibition and a catalog of “Aaron Douglas and the Harlem Renaissance.”

The exhibit, organized by Susan Earle, curator of the museum’s European and American art, will present the first retrospective of Douglas’ work.

It is scheduled to open in March 2006 and then to travel to three other museums.

The accompanying catalog will include essays by Earle as well as outside scholars of the Harlem Renaissance. The Luce Foundation will be the primary sponsor for both the exhibition and catalog.

The Topeka-born Douglas (1899-1979) became famous as a painter and muralist during the Harlem Renaissance, the period of African-American expressive culture in the 1920s and 1930s.

In 1937 he became founder and chair of the fine arts department at Fisk University in Nashville, Tenn. He retired in 1966.