Andy Warhol Museum

»	Without Sanctuary: Lynching Photography in America

Project Description
The Andy Warhol Museum presented a traveling exhibition, Without Sanctuary: Lynching Photography in America, comprised of 100 photographic prints and postcards from 1870 to 1960 that document the history of lynching in the United States.  Recent racially motivated killings in Pittsburgh had heightened existing racial tensions, and the exhibition provided a potent context for dialogue about race in the city.  The Warhol worked with a Community Advisory Group to determine how the exhibition should be presented and interpreted both within and outside the museum.  Open Forums, art-making dialogues led by artist/educators, provided visitors with expressive, reflective, dialogic, and informational outlets to process and learn from their experience of viewing the images.  A range of other dialogue opportunities included daily facilitated public dialogues, group tour discussions, public lectures, panel discussions, performances, use of the museum as a space for community groups to hold meetings and dialogues around race relations, and artist/educator outreach projects that extended the dialogue into the community.  For training and to lead dialogues, artist/educators and museum staff partnered with the National Conference for Communities and Justice, YWCA Study Circles, and Facing History and Ourselves/New York Chapter.   A timeline, depicting African American achievement and resistance set against the history of lynching in America, was developed in collaboration with community advisors.  This exhibit has been reproduced for distribution to all high schools in Allegheny County.