[Church Fans And Road Maps] -

Amos Paul Kennedy, Jr., 2010. Kennedy, Jr., Amos Paul. 136 church fans, each with the name of an individual killed while working for civil rights in the United States from the 1940s through the 1960s. The names, and the dates and locations of their murders, are printed in blue, while on each "Murdered" is printed in red. The fan format recalls those distributed in Southern churches on a hot summer Sunday, lending to the set a sense of community, and of collective grieving. Some last names are repeated, with matching years of death; and it seems out of the set one could trace whole families, whole lineages of protest. Notable names include Martin Luther King, Jr. and Emmett Till.

Completing the archive are thirteen state-issued roadmaps, one for each of the states identified on the fans; on these Kennedy has printed a red number, corresponding to the number of victims. Mississippi, for example, has 54, and New York has 1. The numbers add up to the 136 names, so that the maps serve as a tactile and visual index to the fan set.

Altogether a remarkable, stark collection, a printed data-visualization with incredible communal and emotional reach. Fine.