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Save the date – Asbury Park artist Charles Trott returns with another installation of his Diasporic Images of Africa [DIA] project.

Black Like Me is the title of this African-American History Month educational art display running through month’s end at the Asbury Park Public Library.

On Feb 21, Trott will offer a 2 to 7 p.m. expanded art exhibit, with a 6 p.m. presentation and discussion in the Bradley Room of the First Avenue located library.

DIA aims to spotlight Africa’s relationship to cultures and countries across the globe by using visual art and the teachings of authors seldom feature in public school curriculums, Trott said.

Known locally for his murals at the Westside Community Center, Boys and Girls Club, and most recent Asbury Park Day banner, Trott spent years teaching art education in several school districts across the State, including Newark.

He taught art in Bermuda and was an artist in residence for the Bureau of Prisons in Miami, and in similar a capacity for Monmouth Museum, the New Jersey Department of Education, the Monmouth County Parks System, and with Seton Hall’s Upward Bound program.

The 1969 Asbury Park High School and Pratt Institute graduate’s DIA project has led him across the globe, from Cuba to Egypt.

“The purpose of these exhibits is to promote and keep, in the vision and memory of the people here in the United States, our various histories,” Trott has said. “I find that we, here in America, don’t know much about one another, and we know even less about those who come from somewhere else. We need to look at these so called minority groups because they are not a minority.”

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