From Absence to Presence, Commemorating Contributions of Enslaved Peoples

In From Absence to Presence, a slave quarter materializes, making the invisible visible. The surfaces are configured in a staggered pattern of Ipe and mirror polished stainless-steel waterjet cut with text. The text is taken from local historical runaway slave advertisements to create erasure poetry. At night, the words of poetry are illuminated and projected upon the ground, keeping eternal vigil to the memory and resilience of the enslaved people who once lived on the grounds of St. Mary’s College. Based on the social justice impact of this project, we were named one of Codaworx's “25 Cr...