Event poster for COA's upcoming "People's History of Chattanooga" gallery showing
Chattanooga Organized for Action, a local grassroots social justice organization, has announced UTC’s gallery exhibit titled “History Is,” will feature the first five posters in COA’s “People’s History of Chattanooga” project. The event will begin at 6 p.m. on Thursday, Feb. 25, at Apothecary Gallery for Graphic Design on 744 McCallie Ave. The exhibit is free and open to the public.
The artwork has been created in collaboration with UTC graphic design majors and will focus on key figures and events in the history of Chattanooga’s struggle against racism.
The People’s History project hopes to reclaim the city’s historical narrative and to celebrate the revolutionaries and rebels who fought against oppression in all forms. As said by COA board chair Michael Gilliland, “Chattanooga history is usually presented as a sanitized picture of progress for a mid-sized Southern city, and it tends to focus on the political establishment, business leaders, and other movers and shakers while often ignoring the real perspective of marginalized communities, agitators, and working-class folks whose bitter fights for a better city have left an indelible mark.” COA wants to tell this story; one that highlights the social movements, radical activism, dirty conflicts and everyday heroes that have often remained hidden from cultural awareness, said officials.
With this outlook, the first five posters of the People’s History project offer insights into the brutal institution of white supremacy over a hundred years of Chattanooga history. More importantly, the posters tell the history of the anti-racist resistance, said officials. The posters track the story from early attempts at stopping segregation in the early 1900s by Randolph Miller, an ex-slave and newspaper editor, to the filing of lawsuits by women of color who helped crush the Ku Klux Klan after surviving armed attacks by white supremacists on Martin Luther King Boulevard in 1980.
The posters and prior concept art will be displayed and available at the Feb. 25 gallery event. The “People’s History of Chattanooga” will continue its exploration of the hidden histories of communities of color, women, laborers, the LGBTQ+ movement, and all Chattanoogans who shaped the city by resisting oppression and marginalization by the powerful, said officials.
Guests may RSVP at https://www.facebook.com/events/1031099923621428/
Questions may be emailed to info@chattaction.org