Installation View of Dread Scott: We're Going to End Slavery. Join Us! (Cristin Tierney Gallery, New York. September 17 - December 18, 2021). Photograph by Elisabeth Bernstein.
“Slave Rebellion Reenactment” is making its gallery debut as an exhibition titled after one of the marchers’ chants: “We’re Going to End Slavery. Join Us!” We see Black re-enactors in period costumes moving with passionate determination. Such pictures of Black resistance and liberation seem to fill a historical gap, as a type of image too rarely circulated in public. Yet in some photos, the march is set against a modern backdrop of highways and oil refineries — pieces of infrastructure often built expressly to harm communities of color and perpetuate racism. They serve as stark reminders that while slavery may have ended, it will take much more work and imagination to dismantle its legacy.
