Ever since it was awarded the statue of Robert E. Lee by City Council in December 2021, the Jefferson School African American Heritage Center has been laser focused on its “Swords Into Plowshares Recast | Reclaim” initiative, which will transform the two tons of bronze rendered from the statue into a public artwork. The piece will embody Charlottesville’s shared sense of equity as it honors the enslaved population of the area, and stands as a rebuttal to the day in August 2017 when white nationalists descended on Charlottesville to protest the Lee statue’s proposed removal.
The JSAAHC was determined to create an inclusive process, antithetical to the one surrounding erection of the Lee monument. Following a national juried design competition from which three semi-finalists were chosen—MASS Design Group, PUSH Studio, and Hood Design Studio—their proposals were exhibited at JSAAHC for public comments. With the winning team selected, JSAAHC is asking Charlottesville residents for help again, this time co-creating the final design by getting involved. The goal is to produce a design by the tenth anniversary of the August 2017 Unite the Right rally.
“We’ve been guided by this idea that Charlottesville can heal itself,” says Andrea Douglas JSAAHC
executive director. “We can create a multiracial democratic process that grapples with the fact that something horrible happened in 2017 and then come up with a set of communal values that exists beyond that to produce something that articulates Charlottesville’s current social values and will have resonance for future communities.”
