MONTGOMERY, Ala. — Visitors to the Freedom Monument Sculpture Park wind a winding path past artwork depicting the lives of enslaved people in America and historical exhibits, including two cabins where the slaves lived, before arriving at a towering monument.
Stretching nearly four stories into the sky, the National Monument for Freedom honors the millions of people who endured the cruelty of slavery. The monument is engraved with 122,000 surnames that formerly enslaved people chose for themselves, as documented in the 1870 census, after they were emancipated at the end of the Civil War.
The sculpture park is the third location created by the Equal Justice Initiative in Montgomery, Alabama, which is dedicated to fearlessly examining the nation’s history of slavery, racism and discriminatory policing. The first two locations: the National Memorial for Peace and Justice, a memorial to people killed in racist terrorist killings; and The Legacy Museum: From Enslavement to Mass Incarceration – opened in 2018.
The sculpture park, which opens March 27, weaves together art installations, historical artifacts and personal stories to explore the history of slavery in America and honor the millions of people who endured its cruelty.
Bryan Stevenson, the founder of Equal Justice Initiative, said after opening the first two sites he felt there was more to do. Most tourist attractions on plantations, he said, are centered around the lives of the family that committed slavery. His goal was a place where visitors could have a “truly honest experience with the history of slavery.”
“I see it as a space where truth is told, a place where we can confront parts of our history and paths that are not normally taught,” he said. But he also believes it’s ultimately a “hopeful place.”
“If people find a way to create family and future despite the horrors of that institution, then we can do something similar in our time to create a future that is less burdened by these histories than I think we have been ,” Stevenson said. .
The 17-acre site sits between the winding banks of the muddy waters of the Alabama River and railroad tracks – the two transportation mechanisms used to bring people to the city’s slave markets in the 19th century. Visitors can arrive by boat, essentially following the same path taken to deliver the stolen and trafficked people.
The park opens as some politicians, including in the Deep South, try to set parameters on how race and history are taught in classrooms and during workforce training sessions. Stevenson says such backlash has always been accompanied by progress.
“I see this as a kind of desperate act to cling to the silence, the status quo and the burden of bigotry that we have faced for so long. And I just don’t believe it will work because the truth is powerful,” Stevenson said.
The sculpture park contains important pieces by artists including Simone Leigh. Leigh’s Brick House, a 16-foot bronze bust of a black woman, stands as a formidable presence of power at the entrance to the garden.
In a piece titled Mama, I Hurt My Hand by Kwame Akoto-Bamfo, a child dragging a bag of cotton extends his injured hand to his mother, who is balancing a basket of cotton and a baby strapped to her back. Next to them sits a tired man with battered skin and a splinted leg, exhausted.
The exhibits include two 170-year-old cabins that housed enslaved families on a cotton plantation, a whipping post, chains used to hold trafficked people, and replicas of a transport wagon and slave pen. Interwoven among the exhibits are first-person accounts from enslaved people and former slaves about their lives.
Alison Saar, a Los Angeles-based sculptor, has a piece in the garden that “deals with escaped slaves and their ability to survive and thrive on their own,” she said.
“I find it all incredible and more necessary than ever,” said Saar. Park visitors will encounter sculptures that “convey not only the horrors of slavery, but also the truly beautiful stories and glories of people who somehow escaped it and created a life of their own.”
The centerpiece of the park is the National Monument to Freedom, which bears names taken from the 1870 census in which formerly enslaved people claimed surnames.
Visitors can walk up, find their family name and touch it while seeing their own face reflected in the polished granite – an experience Stevenson himself recently experienced when more names were engraved into the stone.
“I came and I saw my name, and I was surprised by the impact I had because of that, even though I’ve been planning for two years,” he said.
EJI is a legal advocacy organization perhaps best known for its work to free wrongfully convicted death row inmates — the subject of the 2019 film starring Michael B. Jordan and Jamie Foxx, based on Stevenson’s bestselling book “Just Mercy.”
The organization placed the first historical markers in downtown Montgomery years ago to mark the locations of slave markets and lynching sites in the South.
Stevenson said the truth and confronting history are the key for America to move forward. He compares the country to an alcoholic who must acknowledge the damage caused by his abuse in order to move forward.
‘I think something better is waiting for us. I think there is something that feels more like freedom, more like equality, more like justice. But I don’t think we’ll get there unless we break down the barriers and burdens created by our silence about history,” Stevenson said.
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Race & Ethnicity editor Aaron Morrison in New York contributed.
