Sonya Clark Debuts New Installation at Monument Lab's "Declaration House
Sonya Clark (MFA Fiber 1995) recently debuted a new installation as part of Monument Lab’s Declaration House, a public art and history exhibition at Independence Historical Park in Philadelphia. Clark’s work, “The Descendants of Monticello” is a monumental montage, featuring the blinking eyes of Robert Hemmings’ collateral descendants and others related to the over 400 people enslaved at Monticello, including descendants biologically related to Jefferson.
14-year old Robert Hemmings, was Thomas Jefferson’s enslaved valet that he brought with him from his plantation at Monticello, just outside Charlottesville, Virginia to Philadephia in the summer of 1776. Hemmings was also the half-brother of Jefferson’s wife Martha Wayles Skelton. Clark’s research for this project found there are no known historical images of Robert Hemmings, prompting the resulting documentation of his descendants.
The exhibit, on view through September 8, 2024, focuses on the juxtaposition of slavery and freedom at the time the Declaration of Independence was written and the present day. Clark told Axios the installation calls out “the erasures and [fills] in those half-truths with more truths and more stories.”
Learn more:
Descendants of slaves watch from Declaration House in new exhibit – Axios Philadephia
Declaration House – Monument Lab
Declaration House, Independence National Historic Park – National Park Service
