University of Kentucky Memorial Hall mural
Artist: Ann Rice O’Hanlon
Year:
Date of Action: November 25, 2015
Region: North America
Location: Lexington, Kentucky
Subject: Racial/Ethnic
Medium: Painting, Public Art
Confronting Bodies: University of Kentucky
Description of Artwork: Ann Rice O'Hanlon, an alumna of the University of Kentucky, painted the fresco in the University of Kentucky's Memorial Hall in 1934 as part of the Public Works of Art project. The 38 feet wide by 11 feet tall mural contains a variety of visual vignettes depicting southern life, including fishing, constructing log cabins, and passengers riding in a train. It also depicts four African-Americans in a line bending over to pick tobacco, white individuals dancing to music played by black musicians, and a Native American peering from the woods at a white woman gathering water from a stream.
The Incident: Around two dozen black students expressed offense at the depictions in the mural to University of Kentucky President Eli Capilouto. On November 23, Capiluoto released a statement relaying,
"One African American student recently told me that each time he walks into class at Memorial Hall he looks at the black men and women toiling in tobacco fields and receives the terrible reminder that his ancestors were enslaved, subjugated by his fellow humans. Worse still, the mural provides a sanitized image of that history."
On November 25, the entire painting was covered in white sheets. Capiluoto referred to the shrouding as an interim action, as a "long-term answer will take some time."
Results of Incident: The novelist Wendell Berry, related to the artist by marriage and a University of Kentucky alumni, published a critique of shrouding the memorial in the Lexington Herald-Leader, noting, " of the Ann “Ann painted the Memorial Hall fresco in 1934, when it took some courage to declare so boldly that slaves had worked in Kentucky fields...Nobody would have objected if she had left them out. The uniform clothing and posture of the workers denotes an oppressive regimentation. The railroad, its cars filled with white passengers, seems to be borne upon the slaves’ bent backs.”
As of December 10, 2015, the mural remains shrouded.
Source:
• https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/grade-point/wp/2015/12/01/u-of-kentucky-shrouds-a-1934-mural-that-depicts-african-american-slaves/,
• http://uknow.uky.edu/content/memorial-hall-mural-chance-heal-wounds-gain-broader-perspective,
• http://ncac.org/blog/shrouding-history-or-protecting-students-university-of-kentucky-covers-1930s-mural/
