People
Stephen Hayes
Stephen Hayes grew up in Durham, North Carolina. At North Carolina Central University where he had planned to study mechanical engineering, he discovered his fascination with the arts starting with ceramics and venturing into graphic design.
At the Savannah College of Art and Design where he received his MFA, he explored sculpture and his thesis exhibition, “Cash Crop”, is still circulating over a decade later.
Hayes work center around finding beauty and understanding between himself, as a black male artist, and the nature of the object. His work fuses the past and the present, generally based on sociocultural and economic themes, highlighting American history as it relates to race, identity, and stereotypes in the areas of capitalism, commodification of beings, and the subsequent effects of cultural representation.
He recently unveiled a monument for the United States Colored Troops in the Cameron Museum in Wilmington, NC.
“I feel honored to work on a project that acknowledges these individuals who were once natives to this property/land. The memorial will be a vessel that connects the past and the present to the rich history of this state. Although evidence of their physical bodies has naturally become a part of the soil, I hope that the fountain of cast hands and the water speak to the continuous cycle/flow of birth. Life and death.”
Team
The Anson African Burial Memorial resulted from many meetings and many years of work . first from the Gullah Society and then from other groups of concerned citizens. Many of whose names are listed below.
Brenda Lauderback, the chairman of Denny’s, volunteered to head a group to fundraise for the project. Nigel Redden, the former director Spoleto Festival USA, became project leader.
Ad Hoc Committee convened by Mayor Tecklenburg
Stephen Hayes, Artist
Brenda Lauderback, Chair
Nigel Redden, Project Leader
Rick Jerue, Senior Advisor to the Mayor, City of Charleston
Mike Whack, Special Assistant to the Mayor, City of Charleston
Jason Kronsberg, Parks Director, City of Charleston
Rodney Porter, Parks Department, City of Charleston
Edmund Most , Capital Projects, Parks Department, City of Charleston
Scott Watson, Cultural Affairs Department, City of Charleston
Bernard Powers, PhD, Director, Center for the Study of Slavery in Charleston College of Charleston
Anthony Greene, Co-chair, Committee on Commemoration and Landscapes, College of Charleston
Julia Eichelberger, Co-chair, Committee on Commemoration and Landscapes, College of Charleston
R. Grant Gilmore III, PhD, Director, Historic Preservation and Community Planning, College of
Charleston
Joanna Gilmore, Anson Street African Burial Ground Project
La’Sheia Oubre, Anson Street African Burial Ground Project
Johanna Martin-Carrington, Former Board Chair, The Gullah Society
Adrienne Carrington, Civic Leader
Victoria Smalls, Executive Director, Gullah Geechee Heritage Corridor Commission
Latesha Smith, Community Engagement Coordinator, Spoleto Festival USA
Mena Mark Hanna, General Director, Spoleto Festival USA
Nicole Taney, Director of Artistic Planning and Operations, Spoleto Festival USA
Angela Mack, Executive Director, Gibbes Museum of Art
Lissa Frenkel, President and CEO, Charleston Gaillard Center
Tonya M. Matthews, PhD, Chief Executive Officer, International African American Museum
Jonathan Green, International Artist
Jerome Harris, President, Association for the Study of African American Life and History
Brian Turner, Director of Advocacy, Preservation Society of Charleston
Kelly Vicario, Community Outreach Coordinator, Preservation Society of Charleston
Rev. Willie Hill, Jr., Rector, St. John’s Reformed Episcopal Church
Steve Dudash, Director of Special Projects, Navy Yard Charleston
Darrin Goss, CEO, Coastal Community Foundation
Melissa Levesque, Vice-President, Coastal Community Foundation
Millicent Brown, PhD, Historian
Minerva King, Educator
Fundraising & Community Engagement Committee Convened by Maxine Smith
Deborah Kennedy Kennard, Civic Leader
Maxine Smith, Civic Leader
Cheryl Love, Civic Leader
Jonathan Green, Artist
Sandra Campbell, Civic Leader
Rita Scott, Civic Leader
Emily-Elise Martin, Civic Leader
Josette Bailey, Civic Leader
Karen Brewerton, The Beach Company