Blog Post: When Generations Talk

Burgundy, Montreal.

I capture the both of them - mid-tickle and blaming. This is what grandmothers and granddaughters do. They make light, they make joy, they skip over the emotional in-betweens and start fresh. I have thought heavily about the grandmothers before me in this project. Who were they? How were they? And I must admit that my thoughts heavily leaned toward the austere. I rarely imagined them as beings who joyfully and gleefully played with their grandchildren. But, as my mother, daughter and I were walking the streets of Burgundy, Montreal, the city’s Black historical and cultural hub, I caught a glimpse of the generations before me talking, playing, moving life on with joy despite all.

On that day in particular, I was pleasantly surprised when my mother asked if we could find the Black heart of the city (Montreal, Quebec). I was surprised because so often we forget that our African reach around the world is so long. So we walked and talked, and I played observer again. I think I got a glimpse of the grandmothers before me: Betsey, Mary, Frances, Mary, Rachel and Lillian through the exchange. I had never seen them as grandmothers who played, but now I think I have a little idea that they were much more than I had confined them to an austere, oppressive past. They were play masters, too.

From Virginia to DC to Montreal, Perpetual Blackness is on the road in Montreal, Canada.