Flashbacks: Echoes of Past Issues
N C L R ONLINE
125
PHOTOGRAPHS BY ALAN CRADICK ;COURTESY OF CAMERON ART MUSEUM
Boundless, 2021 (bronze sculpture, 16x7.5x3) by Stephen L. Hayes, Jr., Collection of Cameron Art Museum
STEPHEN L. HAYES, JR. was born in Durham and is an Assistant Professor at Duke University. He earned a BA at NCCU in 2006 and an MFA at Savannah College of Art and Design in 2010. He was the 2020 winner of the prestigious 1858 Prize for Contemporary Southern Art. The artist’s work has been featured at the National Cathedral, Rosa Parks Museum, and Harvey B. Gantt Center for African American Art + Culture, among others. His art explores the African American experience, often incorporating historical context, as in his thesis exhibition, Cash Crop, which has been traveling and exhibiting for nearly a decade.
Stephen L. Hayes, Jr. was commissioned by CAMERON ART MUSEUM to commemorate the United States Colored Troops (USCT), who fought for freedom and won the Battle of Forks Road in Wilmington, NC, the current site of the museum. The pivotal battle led to the fall of Wilmington, location of the last seaport of the Confederacy, and soon after, to the end of the Civil War. The life-sized bronze sculpture features eleven of the 1,600 soldiers, many from the region, whose faces were cast from present-day African American descendants of the soldiers, reenactors of the battle, veterans, and community leaders. Boundless was unveiled at Cameron Art Museum on 13 Nov. 2021. Read and see more on the museum's website.
