NEWARK, NJ.- The Newark Museum this week received a half-million-dollar National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) grant in support of its African art initiatives – the largest of eight awarded in New Jersey and representing almost 60 percent of the total monies awarded. The NEH matching grant was awarded to African Art at the Newark Museum: Building for the Second Century, a project directed by Dr. Christa Clarke, Curator of African Art and Senior Curator, Arts of Africa and the Americas . Museum Director Mary Sue Sweeney Price said the grant requires the Museum to raise $1.5 million in matching operating and endowment dollars to fund renovation and expansion of the Museum’s highly-respected African galleries and to support programs, publications and a new assistant curator for the Arts of Africa collection. According to the NEH grant announcement, challenge grants strengthen the humanities by encouraging non-federal