My project, CONTRABAND, visually explores how the industry of slavery laid the blueprint for drug crimes, gang culture, and mass incarceration in Black communities. This project draws from research at the American Antiquarian Society where I used ephemera and manuscripts to visualize the economics of the transatlantic slave trade. I am working to unpack historical connections visually; sometimes words fail me. CONTRABAND will be the culmination of this research and analysis in the form of large scale silkscreen prints, woodblock prints, and animation.
During the Civil War those who escaped slavery and made their way to Union territory were considered “contraband”, or “illegal goods.” I learned that 19th century policies such as the Fugitive Slave Act, which required that escape slaves be returned to their “owners”, and the Slave and Black Codes, which restricted literacy, gathering in groups, participating in business, etc set the precedent for how Black bodies are policed, surveilled, and limited today. I reflected upon what offenses Black folks get charged for today, and how those charges relate to the concept of contraband.
I examined colonial and 19th century currencies and wondered how industries of commodity and value are created in a new society. I explored the ways Black bodies were valued in account books and slave ship manifests. In addition to new currencies, highly valued objects such as guns, gin, and fabric were traded in equal weights for a soon to be enslaved individual. I made connections to the lives of many young men of color who continue to exchange their lives for guns, liquor or drugs. I would be remiss to simplify the connections of the present to this historical context: the relationships are multilayered intricacies of power, privilege and systems which will form my visual representation of CONTRABAND.
I begin with the experiences of my family members and work outward. I see the ways my family wages battle with the prison industrial complex, drugs, and poverty as paradigmatic of experiences shared by other people of color. Through CONTRABAND I seek to unpack the ways that sentencing and state sponsored violences are intimately connected to the technologies of the past to continue a conversation of how to build a new way forward.
