Greenwood Art Project

The Greenwood Art Project invites the public to view and participate in the first two installations by its commissioned artists. On March 31, Katherine Mitchell’s “Greenwood … A Trilogy in Reflection” will be open at the Vernon AME Church, 311 N. Greenwood Ave., from noon to 6 p.m. Then on April 4, Yielbonzie Johnson will present “Lives on the Line – a Greenwood Arts Project” at the Church of the Restoration, 1314 N. Greenwood Ave., from 12:30 p.m. to 6 p.m. A program is scheduled for 2 p.m.

“Ever since it was announced that Tulsa was a winner in the Bloomberg Philanthropies 2018 Public Art Challenge, we have been planning and working toward this day,” said Mayor G.T. Bynum. “From our Call to Artists in the summer of 2019, to the selection of artists in the summer of 2020, to the spring of 2021, when the artists have prepared their works for exhibition, we invite the Tulsa community to participate in this event. One hundred years after the 1921 Tulsa Race Massacre, the Greenwood Art Project is advancing healing in our community through art.”

“Greenwood … A Trilogy in Reflection,” is a site-specific installation made up of three tondo-shaped metal sculptures mounted inside the Vernon AME Church. The first tondo depicts the health, wealth, and stability of Greenwood. The second tondo represents the community’s distress, death of citizens and destruction as a result of the 1921 Tulsa Race Massacre. The third tondo reveals how the strength of the tree symbolized throughout the pieces reflects Greenwood’s autonomy, fragility and resilience.

The Greenwood Art Project, led by artists Rick Lowe and William Cordova with TU professor Jeff Van Hanken, Jerica Wortham, Marlon Hall and Kode Ransom, seeks to raise awareness of the 1921 Tulsa Race Massacre and destruction of its thriving Black community in the historic Greenwood District that included Black Wall Street, one of the most prominent Black-owned business districts in the United States during the early 1900s. The Greenwood Art Project also celebrates the resilience, healing and recovery of the community, with new resonance in today’s challenging times.