Society's Cage
- Year
- 2020
- Type
- Commercial
- Status
- Built
- Firm
- SmithGroup
- Location
- Washington, United States
Society’s Cage is a timely interpretive installation born in the aftermath of the George Floyd and Breonna Taylor murders as our society reckons with institutional racism and white supremacy. The public installation features a bold interpretive pavilion sculpted to symbolize the historic forces of racialized state violence. The experience educates visitors and functions as a sanctuary to reflect, record, and share personal thoughts. It is conceived in solidarity with the Black Lives Matter movement as a mechanism for building empathy and healing. First located prominently on the National Mall, the initial build coincided with the 2020 March on Washington and ran through September 12, 2020. In October 2020, the pavilion was installed on another prominent site, in Baltimore at the War Memorial Plaza across from City Hall. Most recently—May 31 to June 19, 2021—the installation travelled to Oklahoma where it was exhibited for the centennial memorialization of the 1921 Tulsa Race massacre. Going forward, the pavilion will become a public travelling exhibition and continue its educational mission. Discussions are underway with cities and venues across the U.S. and even internationally. The main takeaway from this experience is to help the visitor understand that the murders of George Floyd and Breonna Taylor are not anomalies, but rather the latest examples in a 400+ year historic pattern of unmitigated, unbound, systemic, anti-Blackness in the United States. It provides an opportunity to acknowledge and reckon with the severity of the racial biases inherent in the institutional structures of justice and creates a space for collective reflection, contemplation, sharing, and healing. The pavilion is a series of bars which are hung to form a cube with a cavernous void that symbolizes our imperfect society and justice system. The void is shaped by historical data and serves as a visual metaphor to represent the primary institutional forces of racism that embody the Black American experience
Society’s Cage is a timely interpretive installation born in the aftermath of the George Floyd and Breonna Taylor murders as our society reckons with institutional racism and white supremacy. The public installation features a bold interpretive pavilion sculpted to symbolize the historic forces of racialized state violence. The experience educates visitors and functions as a sanctuary to reflect, record, and share personal thoughts. It is conceived in solidarity with the Black Lives Matter movement as a mechanism for building empathy and healing. First located prominently on the National Mall, the initial build coincided with the 2020 March on Washington and ran through September 12, 2020. In October 2020, the pavilion was installed on another prominent site, in Baltimore at the War Memorial Plaza across from City Hall. Most recently—May 31 to June 19, 2021—the installation travelled to Oklahoma where it was exhibited for the centennial memorialization of the 1921 Tulsa Race massacre. Going forward, the pavilion will become a public travelling exhibition and continue its educational mission. Discussions are underway with cities and venues across the U.S. and even internationally. The main takeaway from this experience is to help the visitor understand that the murders of George Floyd and Breonna Taylor are not anomalies, but rather the latest examples in a 400+ year historic pattern of unmitigated, unbound, systemic, anti-Blackness in the United States. It provides an opportunity to acknowledge and reckon with the severity of the racial biases inherent in the institutional structures of justice and creates a space for collective reflection, contemplation, sharing, and healing. The pavilion is a series of bars which are hung to form a cube with a cavernous void that symbolizes our imperfect society and justice system. The void is shaped by historical data and serves as a visual metaphor to represent the primary institutional forces of racism that embody the Black American experience