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Racial justice art to be added to Washington National Cathedral
Religion News Service
September 29, 2021
Details of stained-glass windows depicting Confederate generals Robert E. Lee and Stonewall Jackson that were removed from the Washington National Cathedral in 2017. Photo by Ken Cobb/© Washington National Cathedral
The windows of one of the nation's most prominent churches have been boarded with plywood for four years.
Leaders at the Washington National Cathedral, where past presidents have been eulogized, hadn't known what to do with the space after removing stained-glass windows that depicted Confederate generals Robert E. Lee and Stonewall Jackson.
Officials announced this week that by 2023, the windows will be filled with work by multimedia artist Kerry James Marshall related to racial justice and the struggles African Americans have faced in their fight for civil rights.
"Kerry James Marshall, one of our nation's greatest artists, has agreed to design the new windows for this cathedral that will be a richer and more fuller expression of the nation we want to be and the ideals that we strive for as a country," said the cathedral's dean, Randy Hollerith.
Marshall called fulfilling the committee's mission "a monumental task" that will take contemplation and wrestling with history.
As for the windows that were removed, they're now displayed as part of 175 objects featured in a new exhibition at the National Museum of African American History and Culture on the Reconstruction era. The exhibition's artifacts were collected to exemplify long-standing themes of religious freedom and changes in economic and political power even as racial violence, including lynchings, terrorized formerly enslaved people.
