Barbara Johnson Zuber

Barbara Zuber (1926 – 2019) was an American painter and illustrator. She was the first African American woman to graduate with a Bachelor of Fine Arts from Yale University. Her work focused on the daily life of African Americans. She contributed the art to Brown is a Beautiful Color and has exhibited her work at the Indianapolis Museum of Art, Gibbes Museum of Art, and the Montgomery Museum of Fine Arts. Her parents were Marion H. and J. Warwick Johnson. She was raised in New York City, where she attended the Little Red School House and graduated from Walden School. She attended New York University and the Art Students League of New York.

Career

After graduation, she taught art in schools, community centers, and at Harlem Hospital's Child Psychiatry Department.

In 1999, Zuber contributed a painting to New York State's The Adoption Album: Our Children, Our Families and designed the cover art for Augsburg Fortress' This Far by Faith: An African American Resource for Worship.

Her work was published in Ebony and Jet. Her work is held in the collections of Johnson Publishing Company. Walter Slezak was a patron. The couple lived briefly in Croton, New York, followed by Troy, New York, when Paul became the first tenured African American professor at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute. Zuber had two children with Paul. She served as President of the Troy YWCA and was a board member of the Troy Boys & Girls Club and Black Dimensions in Art. Zuber died on August 27, 2019, at Our Lady of Mercy Life Center in Guilderland, New York. She was interred at Albany Rural Cemetery.

Legacy

A scholarship is offered in her and Paul Zuber's name at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute.

Notable exhibitions 1970: 15 Afro-American Women, North Carolina A&T State University, Greensboro, North Carolina 2000: SANKOFA: Celebrating 25 Years of Black Dimensions in Art, Albany International Airport, Albany, New York 2003: Transformations: An Exhibition to Honor Black History Month., Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, Troy, New York 2007: Seasons of Change, Capital Repertory Theatre, Albany, New York