Declaration House

Monument Lab

Sonya Clark, Reversals rehearsal still, 2019. Photo by Carlos Avendaño. — Sonya Clark, *Reversals* rehearsal still, 2019. Photo by Carlos Avendaño.

Public engagement during Monument Lab: A Citywide Exhibition, 2017, produced in partnership with Mural Arts Philadelphia, Philadelphia, PA. Photo credit by Steve Weinik. — Public engagement during Monument Lab: A Citywide Exhibition, 2017, produced in partnership with Mural Arts Philadelphia, Philadelphia, PA. Photo credit by Steve Weinik.

Recipient

Grant Year 2022

Grant Amount $300,000

Status Forthcoming

Updated May 30, 2023

A public art installation, public programs, and a publication reframe the history of America’s founding, centering on the story of Robert Hemings, an enslaved valet who aided Thomas Jefferson at the Declaration House, the Philadelphia site where Jefferson drafted the Declaration of Independence. The project’s lead artist Sonya Clark, whose work is concerned with national history and memory, develops an installation that shines a light on Hemings’ legacy and the role Black and Indigenous peoples have played in American history. Additionally, five Philadelphia-area cultural practitioners produce related programs in a “creative programming residency.” The project publication documents the artistic works and reframes what is and is not “self-evident” about the site of the Declaration House across history.

The total grant amount represents project funding plus an additional 20% in unrestricted general operating support.

Recipient

Monument Lab

Monument Lab is a nonprofit public art and history to explore public art, space, and memory. Founded in 2012 by Paul Farber and Pew Fellow Ken Lum, the organization cultivates and facilitates critical conversations around the past, present, and future of monuments, defining a monument as “a statement of power and presence in public.”

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