Carbon pencil, pencil, and blind debossing on nine sheets of paper
In 1865, the Thirteenth Amendment abolished slavery and involuntary servitude except as punishment for a crime. More than 150 years later, artist Kenturah Davis revisited the historical congressional debates over the amendment in order to make this monumental work on paper. By impressing text from the transcribed debates into the paper without using ink, Davis created a textured surface. She then rubbed carbon pencil across the paper to produce an image of a figure. “The structures that shape our experience in the world extend from the ways we use language,” Davis has said. “The implications of this language are activated through our bodies.”
2025
Spot the text.
Look closely: Can you find the words in this picture? Kenturah Davis used a printing press to push the letters into the paper without ink. Then, she drew over them with a pencil. The words are most visible where the pencil shading is darker, filling the portrait with text.
If you used words to make a portrait of yourself, which words would you use?
2025
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Objects of Desire
Gallery 209Touching on themes of legibility and identity, the artworks in this gallery pose the question: What roles do desire and history play in how we understand and recognize each other?
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