Manifest | Thirteen Colonies is a photographic project and journey through the repositories of African American material culture found in libraries, museums, and archives of the original thirteen English colonies and Washington, DC. Conceived by photographer Wendel A. White, this project is a personal reliquary of the remarkable evidence of Black agency and racial oppression stored in public collections. Accompanying his imagery, White discusses his approach to finding, selecting, and photographing artifacts—from rare singular objects to more quotidian materials—and highlights their significance as forensic evidence of Black life and history in the United States. Exhibition at Peabody Museum, Harvard University, March 18, 2024 – April 13, 2025.

Co-published by Radius Books with the Peabody Museum of Archaeology & Ethnology, Harvard University. Order book.