Public Exhibitions

In 2024, the project launched the first of two exhibit experiences that reveal the deep and historic connection between people of African descent and the Pacific Ocean. These public exhibitions, in traveling and gallery exhibit form, are called “Take Me to the Water: Histories of the Black Pacific”

(ABOVE) Traveling exhibit banners and selected artifacts within the Sacramento Public Library in February 2024, Courtesy Sacramento Public Library. (TOP OF PAGE): Maritime Museum of San Diego, Photo by Caroline Collins

Traveling Banner Exhibit

The project’s traveling banner exhibit launched January 2024. Exhibit Envoy, a non-profit that provides institutions with diverse and meaningful traveling exhibitions to strengthen their communities, facilitates its travel throughout the U.S. Pacific.

The exhibit’s themes include:

  • A Sea of Opportunities: freedom and autonomy on the high seas and African roots of seafaring

  • Exploration, Colonization, and Settlement: Black conquistadors, Black/Indigenous relations, discriminatory maritime policies, and Black soldiers and sailors on the water

  • The Environmental History of the Black Pacific: the impact of Black folks’ interactions with the natural world, from hunting to ecology

  • Pacific Connections: how the Pacific Ocean facilitated the exchange of experiences, ideas, and trade goods, and fostered community for people of African descent

Banner Exhibit Components:

  • 14 double-sided retractable banners (1 intro banner, 3 banners for each theme, 1 conclusion)

  • A selection of objects, including compasses, clothing, and raw materials used in shipmaking

  • Multiple AV components

  • Easy-to-install interactive, such as a nautical knot-tying station

  • 1-2 tablets and security stands

Mock Up of future Gallery Exhibit Introduction Panel, Courtesy Pueblo LLC (Ashanti Davis & Sonia Lopez, designers)

Gallery Exhibit

The project’s gallery exhibit will launch in late August 2025 at the Maritime Museum of San Diego (MMSD) within two of their vessel-based galleries on the historic Berkeley steamboat. MMSD’s mission is to serve as the community memory of regional seafaring experience by collecting, preserving, and presenting rich maritime heritage and historic connections with Pacific worlds.

The exhibit’s 6 narrative sections include:

  • African Maritime Traditions: links between many early African-born mariners’ activities and nautical skills acquired via their African heritage

  • Journeying Into the Pacific: how Black folks’ connections to water moved beyond African coasts into the Pacific through exploration, colonization, and settlement including efforts to seek freedom by sea

  • Black Labor at Pacific Docks: Black labor was central to the sociocultural, economic, and political significance of the Pacific region

  • Black Ecologies: Black folks’ impact on Pacific environmental history, from hunting to ecology

  • Patrolling the Pacific: the long history of Black soldiers and sailors who routinely guarded Pacific waters, shores, and lands

  • Building Communities: the Pacific Ocean connected people of African descent, from maritime workplace housing to Black beach enclaves

Gallery Exhibit Components:

  • 6 narrative sections spanning the 16th century to the mid 20th century including “Black Pacific Today” A/V components that connects these histories to our contemporary moment

  • A selection of artifacts including nautical materials, photographs, clothing, diaries, letters, historical records, newspapers, audio interviews, and maritime industry objects such as harpoons, union cards, and scrimshaw

  • Multiple AV components including QR codes

  • Interactive activities, such as a paper canoe-making station on selected dates

  • Live storytelling on selected dates