Decommissioned Confederate Statues From Baltimore To Be Featured In LA Exhibit
BALTIMORE (WJZ) -- Four Confederate monuments owned by Baltimore are heading to a Los Angeles museum exhibit, Mayor Brandon Scott's office confirmed Thursday.
The statues are going across the country to "MONUMENTS," an exhibit by art nonprofit LAXART set to open Fall 2023. The show is curated by LAXART Director Hamza Walker and artist Kara Walker, no relation, and the Museum of Contemporary Art's Senior Curator, Bennett Simpson.
The exhibit will display decommissioned Confederate monuments alongside contemporary art created in response to the statues, according to art news outlet Artnet.
The Baltimore monuments are the Confederate Soldiers and Sailors Monument of Mount Royal Avenue, the Confederate Women's Monument from West University Parkway, the Roger B. Taney Monument from Mount Vernon Place and the Robert E. Lee and Thomas. J. "Stonewall" Jackson Monument from the Wyman Park Dell.
RELATED: The History Of The Now-Removed Confederate Statues Of Baltimore
The statues were taken down overnight in September 2017, days after Baltimore City Council passed a resolution calling for the immediate deconstruction of the statues.
The council's unanimous vote was days after a "Unite the Right" rally in Charlottesville, Virginia that drew white nationalists and counter-protesters turned violent. "Unite the Right" organizers said one of the reasons behind the event was the city's plan to remove a Robert E. Lee monument from a park there.
An idea floated in 2017 by then-Mayor Catherine Pugh was that the monuments could go to Confederate cemeteries. It's unclear where the statues will go when the exhibit ends.