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The Newark Experience

The Ark

Kea's Ark

Tawana, Kea.
Lee Kogan. Encyclopedia of American Folk Art. New York, 2004, p. 512. Available?
"Kea Tawana: Or Who Would Build a Better Ark than Noah?"
Linda Hamalian. Black American Literature Forum 21(1/2), Spring/Summer 1987, 97-112.
Biography of Kea Tawana and history of "Kea's Ark." Photographs of architectural drawings and the ark itself by Camille Billops. Based on an interview conducted by Hamalian and attended by Billops' art class from Rutgers-Newark in 1986. Rutgers-restricted Access
"City Tried to Stop Newark Ark--To No Avail"
Julia Dolan. The Telegraph April 14, 1987, p.39.
"Kea's Improbable Ark: Can This Noble Dream Withstand a City Ghetto's Shifting Sands?"
Chip Brown. Chicago Tribune, April 22, 1987.
"New Jersey Opinion: Why Newark's Ark Should be Saved"
Camilo J. Vergara. New York Times, April 26, 1987.
Includes excerpts from letters sent to Kea Tawana and to government officials.
Two Arks, a Palace, Some Robots, & Mr. Freedom's Fabulous Fifty Acres: Grassroots Art in Twelve New Jersey Communities.
Holly Metz. Newark, City without Walls, 1989. Available?
Dismantling a Dream: Newark's Lost Ark"
John Zeamon. The Record April 11, 1988. Rutgers-restricted Access
Sawdust Memories of the Ark: Ark Builder Moving On,"
John Zeamon. The Record October 7, 1988. Rutgers-restricted Access
"Where I Am Going: Kea's Ark, Newark, New Jersey"
Holly Metz. Southern Quarterly 39(1/2), Fall/Winter 2000/2001, 197-216.
The Ark as "outsider architecture." Available?
Kea's Ark of Newark"
Camilo Jose Vergara. Print 53(5), September/October 1999, 26.
11 years after Newark officials forced her to dismantle the Ark, Tawana revisits Newark with Vergara. Rutgers-restricted Access
"Kea Tawana: The Ark Builder Returns to Visit the Ghosts of Newark"
Camilo Jose Vergara. American Ruins. New York, Monacelli Press, 1999, pp.210-213
Pretty much same text as above, but includes color photographs. Available?
Kea's Ark of Newark: A Project by Gallery Aferro and the Clement A. Price Institute on Ethnicity, Culture, and the Modern Experience
Exhibition at Gallery Aferro, Newark, Sept. 24-Dec. 17, 2016. Available?

Vergara Photographs

Camilo Jose Vergara: Tracking Time: Kea's Ark. 43 photographs from 1984 to 1999.

Saving the Ark

Kea Tawana's Ark Digitized archival collection from SPACES (Aptos, California) on the effort to save Kea's Ark. Correspondance, memos, images.