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Photo Credit: Lorenzo Diggins Jr.

Taylor Bythewood-Porter is a curator and writer. She is the current Curator of History at the Museum of Riverside (MoR). In 2023, she received the American Association for State and Local History Award of Excellence for her exhibition Rights and Rituals: The Making of African American Debutante Culture (2021) at the California African American Museum (CAAM).

Prior to her appointment at MoR and doing independent projects, Bythewood-Porter was an Assistant Curator at CAAM and co-curated Tatyana Fazlalizadeh: Speaking to Falling Seeds (2023), Cross Colours: Black Fashion in the 20th Century (2020), The Liberator: Chronicling Black Los Angeles, 1900–1914 (2019), Making Mammy: A Caricature of Black Womanhood, 1840–1940 (2019), California Bound: Slavery on the New Frontier, 1848–1865 (2018), and Los Angeles Freedom Rally, 1963 (2018), and also contributed to How Sweet the Sound: The History of Gospel Music in Los Angeles (2018), Circles and Circuits 1: History and  Art of the Chinese Caribbean Diaspora  (2017), and Lezley Saar: Salon des Refúse (2017).  

Previously to her position at CAAM, she served as president and a founding member of SIA Curates, a curatorial organization run through Sotheby’s Institute of Art at Claremont Graduate University that connects aspiring curators with Claremont's MFA students to develop yearly exhibitions. Bythewood-Porter is also the recipient of the 2018 Travel Scholarship to attend the Association of African American Museums (AAAM) conference, a participant in the Independent Curators International (ICI) Curatorial Intensive New Orleans 2019, and a participant in the 2021 Professional Alliance for Curators of Color through the Association of Art Museums Curators Foundation (AAMC).

She holds a Master of Arts in art business with a concentration in contemporary art from  Sotheby's Institute of Art at Claremont Graduate University and a Bachelor of Arts in Communications with a focus on public relations and journalism and a minor in art history from Monmouth University.

 
 
 
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Los Angeles Contemporary Exhibitions, Lighting Fund Artist Grant, January 2025

Selection Committee

The Ebell of Los Angeles, “A Woman’s Place,” March 2024

Selection Committee

American Association for State and Local History, September 2023

Award of Excellence, Exhibitions

Saatchi Art, The Other Art Fair - Los Angeles, March 2023

Selection Committee

Los Angeles County Department of Arts and Culture, Illuminate LA - Collective Memory, February 2023

Selection Committee

Artadia, 2022 Boston Artadia Awards, November 2022

Semi-final Juror

Geffen Playhouse, “Art Lives Here”, July 2022

Selection Committee

Los Angeles County Department of Arts and Culture, Hall of Records - Public Defender Office 6th Floor Civic Art Project, June 2022

Civic Art Project Coordination Committee (PCC)

The Association of Art Museum Curators (AAMC) Foundation, Professional Alliance for Curators of Color (PACC), April 2021—January 2022

Participant

Rema Hort Mann Foundation Emerging Artist Grant, January 2020

Los Angeles Nominating Committee Participant 

Independent Curators International (ICI), March 2019

Curatorial Intensive Participant

Prospect 5 New Orleans, November 2018—March 2020

Curatorial Assistant 

 
 
 
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California State University, Dominguez Hills // Les Femmes d' Art, March 2024

Dressed: The History of Fashion // Mildred Blount: The Girl with the Golden Fingers, an interview with Taylor Bythewood-Porter, February 2024

WGN-TV // African American debutante cotillion: Rooted in community, meaningful to families’ histories by Tyra Martin, Micha Materre, February 2024

Altadena Library // Rights and Rituals: The Making of African American Debutante Culture, February 2024

SEIS Gallery // Hedy Torres in Conversation with Taylor Bythewood-Porter, November 2023

Camarillo Public Library // Women’s History Month: A Look Into Being a Museum Curator, March 2023

ACLU of Northern California // Gold Chains: ACLU slavery podcast featuring Taylor Bythewood-Porter, November 2022

Martin Cid Magazine // Jonah Elijah in Conversation with Taylor Bythewood-Porter. Wilding Cran Gallery, July 2022

Los Angeles Breakfast Club // Rights and Rituals: The Making of African American Debutante Culture, April 2022

California State University, Dominguez Hills // Art & Activism: Through the American American Experience, March 2022

Gurl Museum Day // Taylor Bythewood-Porter: IG Live, April 2021

California Lutheran University // "Why is Aunt Jemima Retiring?”: Black Caricature as Mnemonic Device, November 2020

The Broad Museum  // CAAM's Assistant History Curator Taylor Bythewood-Porter on David Hammons's The Door (Admissions Office), July 2019

Los Angeles Downtown News // Preserving a Point in Time In Los Angeles, July 2019

Spectrum News // IN FOCUS: Shaping California History, February 2019