Memorial Celebration for Former YMI Cultural Center Director Harry Harrison

Harry Harrison

Staff Reports

The YMI Cultural Center will host a memorial celebration for former Executive Director Harry Harrison on Sunday, February 26 at 4 p.m. The public is invited to attend.

Harrison, former executive director of YMI Cultural Center, died January 29. Funeral services were held February 4 in his hometown of Columbia, SC. He is survived by his wife, Patricia.

Harrison built his entire career around the arts, beginning at an early
age by drawing in composition books his mother bought him for other
academic lesson plans. Drawing was both an outlet for his creativity as a
child, and a way to occupy himself in a generation long before the
passive entertainments of television and video games.

In a past interview with the The Urban News, Harrison stated, “It was a
way to communicate with friends that helped to avoid confrontations, and
also helped us learn negotiation and problem-solving skills, and to
channel positive energy.”

After earning a BA from Allen University, and a Masters of Arts Degree
in Planning and Public Administration from Pepperdine University,
Harrison could not shake his love and passion for the arts. He started
his arts career with an 18-year stint at the South Carolina Arts
Commission in Columbia, South Carolina. As his experiences in the arts
grew, Harrison was selected as President and CEO of Philadelphia’s
African American Museum. He later served as Vice President of education
and programming at the Charles H. Wright Museum of African American
History in Detroit, Michigan.

Longing to promote the rich cultural African American history of the
south, Harrison took a interim executive director’s position with the
Afro American Cultural Center in Charlotte, North Carolina. When the
position of Executive Director of the YMI Cultural Center became
available Harrison jumped at the opportunity.

Harrison made his mark as a visionary leader willing and even eager to
push the boundaries of expectation in order to increase public interest
in the arts. Harrison was noted for the controversial, “Juke Joint”
multimedia art installation by Willie Little, which depicted the lives
of rural African Americans, and the “That’s Me” photo exhibit which
captured the lives of the local African American throughout the
Asheville and Buncombe County communities.