Sculpture and architecture created a sense of civic identity.
1800–1900 C.E.
videos + essays
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Louis Sullivan, Carson, Pirie, Scott Building
Sullivan believed that “form must ever follow function” and designed this department store with that adage in mind.
Congo Square, New Orleans
From the 18th–19th centuries, Black Americans gathered in Congo Square to socialize, play music, and dance.
Burnham and Root, The Monadnock Building
This early skyscraper stretches the limits of how tall a brick building can be
William Wetmore Story, Cleopatra
What does this marble sculpture of Cleopatra tell us about race and the Civil War in the U.S.?
David Drake, Double-handled jug
Enslaved artist David Drake inscribed a poem onto this jug at a time when literacy among enslaved people was outlawed
Burnham and Root, Reliance Building
How Chicago architecture sprung up thanks to new technology at the turn of the century
Slave Burial Ground, University of Alabama
This plaque is the only marker of the burial ground of people who died while enslaved by the University of Alabama and its faculty.
Monument Avenue and the Lost Cause
A conversation that took place on Monument Avenue in Richmond, Virginia, July, 2021
Defeated, heroized, dismantled: Richmond’s Robert E. Lee Monument
Dedicated in 1890; removed in 2021
Little Round House
The University of Alabama, Civil War, and slavery; examining the role of architecture as historical marker
Soaring upward, Louis Sullivan and the invention of the skyscraper
A miracle on Bleecker Street, ornament, invention, and one of the great early skyscrapers.
The Alamo (& Mission San Antonio de Valero)
At the Alamo, the representation of patriotic heroism and brave sacrifice eclipses Spain’s earlier colonial presence and the history of the site’s ruination, reconstruction, and reframing.
