In I Carry Them On My Back, Of Course!, mixed media artist Alexandria Clay presents a body of work that eagerly searches for shelter from the trauma of experiencing marginalizing spaces. Spanning over several years, her work arrives at the questioning of origins of “safe spaces;” how are they conceived, and who is maintaining them? In Clay’s experience, Black matriarchs constantly craft and preserve places of refuge in her community–-a practice that is due in part to domestic expectation. In the most recent work, Clay contends with this undervalued labor and the impact it has on the women in her life.

Through a series of multimedia collages which construct ideal worlds, followed by an expanding practice in portraiture, Clay aims to bring a specific, emotional trial to light, and to make known the invisible efforts that sustain her community.

This exhibition is presented by The Black on Black Project and funded in part by the Kenan Fund.

RELATED READING LIST

• “A Black Women’s History of the United States,” Daina Ramey Berry and Kali Nicole Gross

• “Lighting the Fires of Freedom,” Janet Dewart Bell

• “Ella Baker and the Black Freedom Movement: A Radical Democratic Vision,” Barbara Ransby

• “The Three Mothers,” Anna Malaika Tubbs

• “The Speeches of Fannie Lou Hamer: To Tell It Like It Is,” Maegan Parker Brooks and Davis W. Houck

• “Song in a Weary Throat,” Pauli Murray

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