What I Was Here accomplishes with its public art and public history installations is a reverent and powerful acknowledgment of American history.
The I Was Here project began in Lexington, Kentucky in 2016 as emblematic Ancestor Spirit Portraits created by photographing contemporary African Americans as archetypal Ancestor Spirits. The portraits embody Family: mother, father, brother, sister. They form cohesive, ethereal images that convey the dignity of the African American individual and family – imagery mostly missing in America’s Visual History. The project uses arts and technology to educate, create memorials, guardians and reshape our understanding of history and how we experience public space.
“I feel safe. I am welcomed in this space. I can enter this space.”
The “here” of I Was Here begins with an honest look at the history of place and creates a monument to a people. Through these installations, the iconic Spirit Portraits create a visual for an invisible history. They ask us to examine who we are to each other, who we are as a nation, and how we can work to heal the wound in our citizenship created by enslavement.
Slavery was introduced to Manhattan in 1626. By mid-18th century, about one in five people in New York City were enslaved. Almost half of Manhattan households included at least one enslaved person. Although the state abolished slavery in 1827, abolition didn’t come until 1841. The use of enslaved labor elsewhere for the production of sugar and cotton was essential to the economy of New York both before and after the Civil War.
The Podium at One World Trade Center is the main building of the rebuilt World Trade Center complex in lower Manhattan. The spiritual significance of an I Was Here installation on this site, originally called The Freedom Tower is powerful.
The images will rise impactfully 200 feet up from the ground, visible from four strong vantage points. On display from May 13 – 22, this will be a key installation of Design Pavilion, New York’s premiere public design exhibition. Created in partnership with CODAMADE, animated Ancestor Spirit Portraits on the Freedom Tower will create a monument to those who built much of this country – including many of the buildings on Wall Street.
By introducing this project at this public site, we hope to raise awareness, which is the beginning of healing.