The Power of Memorials and Public Art: Complex Histories and Legacies Today

Dr. Eve L. Ewing is a Chicago-based sociologist of education. She is the award-winning author of four books, including a book for young readers Maya and the Robot; the poetry collection 1919, the nonfiction work Ghosts in the Schoolyard: Racism and School Closings on Chicago's South Side, and her first book, the poetry collection Electric Arches, which was named one of the year's best books by NPR and the Chicago Tribune. She is the co-author (with Nate Marshall) of the play No Blue Memories: The Life of Gwendolyn Brooks. She also wrote the Ironheart series and the Champions series for Marvel Comics. Ewing is an assistant professor at the University of Chicago School of Social Service Administration.

L’Merchie Frazier, visual activist, public historian, educator, artist, innovator, and poet, is the Executive Director of Creative / Strategic Planning for SPOKE Arts and was formerly Director of Education and Interpretation for the Museum of African American History, Boston/Nantucket. Her innovative focus supports social and reparative justice and the quest for civil and human rights through the lens of five hundred years of Black and Indigenous history. She was awarded the Boston Foundation Brother Thomas Fellowship. Her work highlights the reparative aesthetic approach to expand the historical narrative, diminishing erasure, responding to trauma, violence, and crisis through artistic activities and public art that mirrors community. Her work is based on authentic evidence, providing place-based education and interdisciplinary history pedagogy, programs and workshops, projects, and lectures. She delivers diversity, equity, and belonging workshops for corporations and municipalities. 

Frazier has served the artistic community for over twenty years as an award-winning national and international visual and performance artist and poet, in one life work “Save Me From My Amnesia”, with residencies in Brazil, Taiwan, Costa Rica, Africa, France, and Cuba. Her works mirror the community. Her artworks are collected by the Smithsonian Institution, the White House, the Museum of Arts and Design, the Minneapolis Institute of Art, and the Dallas Museum of Art. She is a State of Massachusetts Arts Commissioner. She is also a past City of Boston Artist in Residence.

Sarah Elizabeth Lewis is an art and cultural historian. She is an associate professor of history of art and architecture and African and African American studies at Harvard University and the founder of Vision & Justice. Lewis also serves on the Standing Committee on American Studies and Standing Committee on Women, Gender, and Sexuality at Harvard University. Her research focuses on the intersection of visual representation, racial justice, and democracy in the United States from the nineteenth century through the present. Her books and edited volumes include The Rise, translated into seven languages, Carrie Mae Weems, which won the 2021 Photography Network Book Prize, and “Vision & Justice” by Aperture magazine which received the 2017 Infinity Award for Critical Writing and Research from the International Center of Photography. In 2019, Lewis received the Freedom Scholar Award, presented by The Association for the Study of African American Life and History for her body of work and its “direct positive impact on the life of African-Americans.” She was named an Andrew Carnegie Fellow in 2022.

Michael Murphy is an architect, artist, educator and writer. Michael P. Murphy Studios, focuses on spatial change and transformation in the public realm.  Michael was the partner with Hank Willis Thomas on The Embrace, and lead the design of the 1965 Freedom March Plaza as Executive Director and Founder of MASS Design Group, which he lead until December 2022. Michael’s recent book, The Architecture of Health, traces the history of medical design and its attempt to align architecture with health outcomes. Michael is the current Thomas Ventulett Chair of Architecture at Georgia Tech, and serves on the board of MASS Design Group, which he founded and led until 2022; where he was the lead designer of such projects as the Butaro District Hospital, the National Memorial For Peace and Justice, and the National Gun Violence Memorial. Michael has a BA from University of Chicago, an M.Arch from Harvard graduate school of Design, and lives in Boston with his wife and two children.