ANNAPOLIS, Md. — The Banneker-Douglass-Tubman Museum in Annapolis is home to a new exhibit about a year in the making — one that examines 250 years of U.S. history through the work of 17 African American female artists, many of them from Maryland, Washington, D.C., and Virginia.
"She Speaks: Black Women Artists and the Power of Historical Memory" is now on display and runs through January 2027.
Curator Martina Dodd said the exhibit was designed to center voices and histories that have often gone unrecognized.
Black women artists explore 250 years of U.S. history in new Annapolis exhibit
"We really wanted to showcase how black women have contributed to the founding of this nation. How black women scholars and artists have been able to be critical sometimes of this nation's history and also to be innovative with the futures that we're building every day," Dodd said.
The exhibit features a wide range of artistic mediums.
"We have paintings. We have sculptures, mixed media work, installations. We have this beautiful mural that highlights many of the archival images of black women from this collection," Dodd said.
Dodd said the exhibit is also about preserving stories that exist outside of traditional institutions.
"We want to make sure that we're acknowledging the histories that maybe aren't in the national archives that maybe aren't in a textbook or a library but also honoring traditions of passing on stories from generation to generation," Dodd said.
Among the featured artists is Ada Pinkston, whose performance artwork is one of the exhibit's standout pieces. Her work, "Landmark," is a tribute to civil rights activist Fannie Lou Hamer.
"She also played a huge role in making sure that black people in the state voted, um, and so there aren't many statues that honor Fannie Lou Hamer and the performance again was meant to imagine like what would it look like to embody her um and embody her voice," Pinkston said.
Pinkston performed "Landmark" in Baltimore on the site where Confederate statues of Stonewall Jackson and Robert E. Lee once stood. The statues were removed in the middle of the night in August of 2017, following a series of protests across the country.
Dodd said the work on display captures both pain and perseverance.
"They're highlighting the traumatic somethings they're highlighting our everyday lives but also monumental acts of resistance and rebellion and I think that's really important when telling the story of this country," Dodd said.
The exhibit is also interactive. Visitors have the opportunity to write the name of a Black woman who needs to be remembered and leave it behind.
"She Speaks: Black Women Artists and the Power of Historical Memory" is on display at the Banneker-Douglass-Tubman Museum in Annapolis through January 2027.
The Banneker-Douglass-Tubman Museum is open Tuesday through Saturday from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m.
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