September – October 2024
Clover Archer
Forget-Me-Not: Reverend Peyton M. Lewis
Clover Archer, a multifaceted artist and curator with a rich background spanning photography, drawing, performance, texts, video, and installation, brings a unique perspective to her work, which often delves into granular histories and the ordinary moments often overlooked by time.
The “Forget-Me-Not: Reverend Peyton M. Lewis” installation on view through December 8, invites viewers to reflect on how individual lives often obscured by broader historical narratives can be illuminated through the fragments and traces left behind. Through this lens, the project emphasizes the importance of recognizing and preserving these “clews” as essential elements of our collective heritage and personal identity. For this installation, Archer invites visitors to engage fragmentary details about the life of Reverend Peyton M. Lewis (1849-1934) who, as an enslaved child, lived in the Roanoke Valley and whose father and uncle, enslaved by local builders, likely helped to construct several structures on campus.
Funded by the Copenhaver Scholar-in-Residence and The Joanne Leonhardt Cassullo Center for Art in collaboration with The Center for Studying Structures of Race
