Project Title

There Is No End to Out: Art, Landscape, and Black Geography

Project Description

Landscape architect Walter Hood asks, how can art and design function as mnemonic devices to remember Black landscapes? My dissertation explores this question by tracing the spatial and environmental relationships in the works of four African American artists during the twentieth century. Through four interconnected case studies this project demonstrates how the works of Jacob Lawrence, Alma Thomas, Noah Purifoy, and Beverly Buchanan can help us all tend to Black landscapes in the United States. Drawing on spatial theories and methods from multiple disciplines, I argue the layered geographic stories of these artists’ works offer ways to reconsider both the generative and violent spatial patterns we have inherited.