On Monday, Nov. 8, the Fairfield University Art Museum (FUAM) will welcome activist Tamara K. Lanier to lead a virtual lecture at 5 p.m. The event, free and open to the public, will be broadcast by thequickcenter.com, but  FUAM will be taking advance registrations.

In 1850, the famed Harvard scientist, Louis Agassiz, commissioned photographer J.T. Zealy to capture nude images of women named Renty and Delia as well as other African-born enslaved men and women. Pointing to the stark physical differences, Agassiz theorized that Black people were a separate and inferior species, deserving to be enslaved.

These infamous daguerreotype images are in Harvard's collection today. In 1995-96, artist Carrie Mae Weems drew on the daguerreotypes for the series From Here I Saw What Happened and I Cried. As Renty and Delia's descendant, Lanier filed a landmark reparations lawsuit against Harvard in 2019 for the return of the daguerreotypes. The lawsuit, conducted with the assistance of civil rights attorneys Benjamin L. Crump and Michael Koskoff, asked the courts to consider: who should own the rights to the violence of the past?

Presented in conjunction with the exhibition Carrie Mae Weems: The Usual Suspects.  

This exhibition is organized by LSU Museum of Art in collaboration with LSU College of Art + Design, and LSU School of Art. At the Fairfield University Art Museum, this exhibition is made possible by the generous support of the #UNLOAD Foundation. The Mary and Eliza Freeman Center for History and Community is a community partner for the museum’s programming this fall.