Beyond Granite: Pulling Together

The National Mall is such an iconic spot, the beating heart of tourism in DC and known to millions more through television and film. It's also been the site where news has been made including Marian Anderson's concert at the Lincoln Memorial in 1939 after being barred from the DAR's Constitution Hall due to her race, and Martin Luther King's "I have a dream speech" delivered during the March on Washington 60 years ago today.  In addition to the monuments honoring those who died in World War II, Korea, and Vietnam, it's been the place where the AIDS quilt was first displayed in 1987 and where a sea of white flags memorialized the hundreds of thousands who had died of Covid as of October 2021.

More joyous moments have also taken place here, including the Fourth of July Fireworks and the annual Smithsonian Folklife Festival. For the locals, it's an inviting space to ride a bike; take a run; and play frisbee, softball, volleyball, and even polo (on the adjacent Potomac Park grounds). Countless engagement photos have been taken among the cherry trees, particularly at the DC War Memorial tucked between the Reflecting Pool and Independence Avenue.

But surprisingly it has not been used for curated installations of public art, that is until now.  Pulling Together, an exhibition of six large works stretching from the Lincoln Memorial to 12th Street, is the first. Billed as an effort to bring untold stories to the Mall, it's part of a larger initiative, Beyond Granite.

To be honest, I often let laziness keep me away from the Mall. Although it's only about 5 miles from my house to the Lincoln Memorial by car, it's not that easy to access on public transportation and parking is pretty scarce. (That said, access to the Capitol, Smithsonian museums, and the Washington Monument are an easy Metro ride plus short walk away.) But last week, I took advantage of a spectacular, rare August day with moderate temperatures and low humidity to take a look. It wasn't easy to capture all the pieces with an iPhone but here's a sampling of what I saw.  

First up was Of Thee We Sing by vanessa german, a Black queer artist, whose work focuses on "the healing realms of intimacy, tenderness, and human wholeness."  This evocation of Marian Anderson is made of resin and steel, her skirt fashioned from blue bottles, with mirrored hands rising up to support her.  At its base, we see the audience of Black Washingtonians who came out that Easter Sunday to hear her sing.

Wendy Red Star's The Soil You See is nestled in Constitution Gardens, on the Mall's north side. The glass thumbprint is covered with the names of indigenous tribal leaders who ceded their lands, not with their names but with a thumbprint or X.  The leaders here are from Red Star's own Apsaalooke (Crow) Nation.  The setting, next to a small monument to the signers of the Declaration of Independence, makes a statement as well.

Derrick Adams' America's Playground is just that -- a fully operational playground that evokes Black joy as well as the desegregation of DC's own public playgrounds in 1954 using archival photos of children playing in previously all-white Edgewood Park. On my visit, I saw two sisters enjoying themselves -- climbing on bars and playing a xylophone, a welcome respite from all the other nearby spaces where visitors are advised not to touch, and certainly not to climb.

Pulling Together continues through September 18.  The exhibition website is rich with information about the artists and their work. You can also find out more about the history of the Mall itself.  If you're local, get yourself down there soon.