Red Summer exhibition at the Residential College Art Gallery, University of Michigan.
January 8 to February 21, 2025.
The Red Summer portfolio represents the stories of various locations in the American landscape where racial violence (often characterized as “Race Wars” at the time) erupted between 1917 and 1923. These years of conflict reveal several aspects of racial anxiety that inform our contemporary experience, including, though not limited to; racism, fear of violent black revolt, lynching, poverty, mass incarceration, and competition for employment. The term “Red Summer” was first used by James Weldon Johnson to describe the violent attacks against black communities during 1919.