In 2014, I started the conceptual seeds for what became a larger project called LandMarked. During this time, I was visiting a family member in Yazoo, a town that is north of Jackson. This is a state where many roads have not been paved for years. The infrastructure of the capital continues to erode. Meanwhile confederate monuments in Jackson remain heavily maintained and never derelict. At this moment, in 2015, I realized that there is a direct relationship between the built environment that exists in monument and memorial landscapes and inequities that exist in other parts of our society.
Stone, cement, bronze, plaster, these are the materials that make the form of the object that we call a monument. But what are concepts, spirits, philosophies that are behind these objects? The current mythology that exists in public space is didactic and maintains the same systems of power structures that we see in other parts of our society in the United States. To this day, monumental landscapes are the subjects of acrimonious debate and reflect the hard lines that are ever present in the subject of today’s cultural wars. Because cultural wars are incredibly nuanced, the necessity to fill the guns with flower bullets is that much more important. I view this ongoing work around monuments and public memory as a way to set the stage for healing and a more just and equitable future with happy and healthy people who see the importance of understanding the world beyond the mythology of the characters created on the pages of history text books that take up the most space in conservative textbooks.
The LandMarked project started in 2017 with the support of CLLCTIVLY in Baltimore. I received this small grant of $500 to realize the seeds of this initial vision after a series of rejections from other large funders. The following year, the work was further incubated with the support of The Halcyon Arts Lab with a temporary memorial for the GU272. After that, the work was supported by a Monument Lab Transnational Fellowship co-organized by Goethe Institute and finally, in 2020, the work was supported by LACMA and Snapchat’ AR monument project.
I am a scholar, educator and community artist who has created work. Presently, I am on the program advisory committee for Vis Arts, Maryland Art Place and am a mentor for artists that participate in the Hamiltonian arts Collective. This year, I was appointed to be a part of the Commission on African American History And Culture for the State of Maryland under the leadership of Governor Wes Moore. Born in New York, my artistic research interest spans the social sciences, global colonial histories, American Studies, and community art practices. My work has been featured at a variety of spaces including The Smithsonian Arts and Industries Building, The Baltimore Museum of Art, The Walters Art Museum, The Peale Museum, Transmodern Performance Festival, P.S.1, The New Museum, Light City Baltimore and the streets of Berlin, Baltimore, Orlando, Washington DC, and New York. I have presented lectures on public space at a variety of places including and not limited to, The French Embassy, NYU, UCLA, USC, and The National Gallery of Art. I am also an alumnus of the Monument Lab+Goethe Institute Transnational Fellowship. My most recent work can be found in the permanent collection of the Los Angeles County Museum of Art.