The Midwest, known for its expansive terrain and industrial legacy, has played a crucial role in the evolution of Black history in the United States. From the era of enslavement through the civil rights movement and beyond, the experiences of Black communities in this region have profoundly shaped their own futures and impacted the broader American societal landscape.

Organized for the Third Biennial Black Midwest Symposium, Roots and Horizons brings together the work of artists who received the inaugural Artist Fellowships from the Black Midwest Initiative in Summer 2023. The selection presented here rethinks the idea of the Black Midwest from a variety of expansive perspectives.

The themes range from the history of Midwestern cities andtheir Black communities to collecting oral histories and building accessible archives. Some artists consider individual identities and what it means to operate on an intersectional level as a Black Midwesterner. And while certain works focus on the resilience of Black communities throughout history, others dwell on the present moment and address current issues. Together, they reimagine potential futures—new horizons—for the Black Midwest, rooted in dialogue with their past, communities, and one another.

 Artist Biographies

Alyssa Killin is an artist and designer from Des Moines, Iowa, who holds a BFA in Interior Design from Iowa State University. After earning a TESOL certification in Cambodia and teaching in Bangkok, she pursued an MFA in Integrated Visual Arts. She is currently studying for a second Master’s in Community and Regional Planning and working as a graduate assistant at the Margaret Sloss Center for Women and Gender Equity. Her work focuses on activism and community connection.

april l. graham-jackson is a third-generation Black Chicagoan whose research and creative work explores how racial capitalism, geographic development, urban to sub\urban migration, and music and sound shape Black identity formation and a Black sense of place across the Chicago Metropolitan Area. Dr. graham-jackson is a Department of Sociology Postdoctoral Scholar and Mansueto Fellow at the University of Chicago. She graduated from Mount Holyoke College with a bachelor’s degree in Black Geographies and from UC Berkeley with a Ph.D. in Geography.

Derek Holland is a multimedia artist and researcher based in Chicago with roots in Maryland and Philadelphia. Their work spans painting, sculpture, film, and site-specific projects, focusing on underexplored forms of knowledge and critiquing societal constructs like Blackness, data, and public health. Holland has earned a Bachelors of Science (B.S.) in Family Science from University of Maryland, College Park and a Master of Public Health (MPH) from Washington University in St. Louis and recently received their Master of Fine Arts (MFA) from University of Illinois at Chicago.

J. Coley is a Postdoctoral Research Fellow at Syracuse University’s Lender Center for Social Justice. As an urban sociologist and public scholar, their research focuses on the lived experiences of Black and Brown communities facing gentrification and housing market pressures. Coley’s work employs qualitative methods to address how race shapes experiences of neighborhood change in historically Black neighborhoods in mid-sized cities.

Roderick E. Jackson ia Black Chicagoan and Ph.D. student in African American Studies at UC Berkeley. His work investigates the value of Black, working-class men in the post-industrial labor market of Northwest Indiana. His research focuses on Gary, exploring how these men build community in marginalized spaces post-Great Recession through oral history and visual ethnography. Jackson is also a music producer with the Grammy-certified duo Tensei and the principal photographer for a multimedia project on Black life in Chicagoland.