Originally published in the Summer/Fall 2025 edition of the Virginia Defender, issue 77, printed December 11. Reproduced here for accessibility and archival purposes. To find other stories in the Summer/Fall 2025 issue or to download the full PDF, see this post. For other issues dating back to 2012, see the Full Issues page.

By Ana Edwards

Construction continues on the 10,000-square foot Shockoe Institute at Richmond’s Main Street Station, but programs have been underway since early this year, either as virtual events or in collaboration with other cultural institutions, including the VCU Institute for Contemporary Art, Virginia Museum of History & Culture and the Library of Virginia. Once its doors open to the public in April 2026, the Institute’s core exhibit, “Expanding Freedom,” will take visitors through seven themes for telling Richmond’s history.

The first, “Clash of Cultures,” is the basis for current programming being coordinated by the Institute’s founding artistic director, Leyla McCalla. On Nov. 20, “Imagining Solidarity” featured performances by three Afro-Indigenous artists: Martha Redbone, Mali Obomsawin and Charly Lowry, and a conversation led by Dr. Tiffany Lethabo King of UVA’s Black & Indigenous Feminist Futures Institute (BIFFI).

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