Altared Code

Altared Code is a mixed media installation built out of the remnants of the Black Fugitive Sukkah. Featuring a series of micropaintings woven onto a wall of recycled cardboard. Each micropainting is coded with symbols that represent information about self-liberating Black people, sourced from Runaway Slave advertisements. Viewers are invited to sit in reflection, listen to the soundscape, and read the butcher paper zines accompanying the installation. The wall itself becomes both ocean and outerspace. It is a roadmap, an altar, an archive, and a ritual of remembrance. Altared Code honors the legacies of self-liberating ancestors and affirms the ways their practices continue to shape movements for Black liberation.

Altared Code debuted at The Revival, a community offering curated by SWAP DC in 2021.

It was supported by the Washington Project For the Arts Wherewithal Research Grant.