Racial slavery remains one of the most vexed issues in American and New World history. Its legacies haunt and shape our contemporary lives. Utilizing historic artwork from the Brown University Library Instructional Image Collection, the exhibition A Peculiar Aesthetic examines how these images coalesce to represent a world in which plantations, slave markets and dwellings, maroon ambushes, cosmetic boxes, figurines and decorative tables, and printers’ typefaces of runaway slaves – evoke again and again the realization of how central slavery was to ways of life within New World and American society.

This exhibition is on view May 21, 2015 through October 31, 2015 at the Center for the Study of Slavery and Justice. Gallery hours are Monday through Friday, 8:45am-3:45pm.

If you are interested in bringing a group or visiting outside of our normal hours, please email slaveryjustice@brown.edu.