A long-awaited museum of Black American history built on the site of a former South Carolina slave port is finally opening its doors to the public after over two decades of planning. Charleston’s International African American Museum (IAAM), opening next Tuesday, June 27, has been in the works since 2000, when the city’s former Mayor Joseph P. Riley, Jr. first announced plans for the historic institution. Since then, the museum has raised nearly $100 million in funds to support its construction, which began in 2019.
The museum’s inauguration will come a little over a week after the celebration of Juneteenth in the United States, held tomorrow, June 19. Recognized as a federal holiday beginning in 2021, Juneteenth commemorates the day when enslaved African-American people in Texas learned of their emancipation on June 19, 1865 — months after the end of the Civil War and over two years after President Lincoln signed the Emancipation Proclamation.
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About a mile from city hall, the museum was built on the site of Gadsden’s Wharf, where an estimated 100,000 enslaved African individuals disembarked between 1783 and 1807. The new museum will explore the historical and cultural impact of the African diaspora on local, national, and international scales through an empathetic, critical storytelling lens.
There will be specific exhibitions dedicated to Charleston and the South Carolina low country, focusing on the local area’s role in shaping African-American history culturally and economically. At the site where the wharf’s edge used to exist, below the IAAM, a 245-foot steel installation will honor the regions from where enslaved African people were originally kidnapped before being brought to the port.
“I am excited to stand with the people of Charleston as we steward this sacred site and the often-silenced stories of American history — both the horrific and the victorious — that continue to challenge our efforts to create a more perfect union,” IAAM President Tonya Matthews said in a 2021 press statement.
“This is a national story with global impact, and we look forward to engaging the critical partnerships and support that are needed to help us sustain this work,” Matthews said.
The IAAM will serve as an important educational resource on African-American history in an area that has recently been grappling with its role in slavery. In 2018, the city council issued a public apology recognizing the city’s part in the slave trade during the 17th to 19th centuries.
In the past year, the county was also the target of Republican lawmakers over claims of critical race theory in the school district’s educational curriculum. In November 2022, the conservative South Carolina Freedom Caucus filed suit against Charleston County School District (CCSD), alleging that the district’s partnership with educational nonprofit EL Education had brought concepts relating to critical race theory into its schools.
In response, the CCSD filed to dismiss the suit “based on the Plaintiffs’ lack of legal standing to bring this lawsuit,” the school district said in a statement to the local press.
This week, the IAAM will host two events in recognition of its grand opening next Tuesday. On Thursday, June 22, the museum will host a multi-faith-based worship service at the Morris Brown AME Church on Morris Street. This event will also be available via live stream for those to attend virtually. Additionally, on Saturday the museum will have a celebratory event in Marion Square which will include live music and poetry readings by local artists, Black-owned food trucks and vendors, and other community activities.
Then, starting next week, visitors can visit the IAAM’s nine galleries featuring 11 permanent exhibitions that follow the transatlantic journey of African-American people spanning ancient to modern times. These permanent exhibitions will feature 150 original artifacts, more than 30 artworks, and almost 50 films and digital media.
The museum will also offer a multitude of educational resources that visitors can interact with, such as a digital table map in the South Carolina Connections Gallery that offers visitors a geographic understanding of African-American history in the state, as well as a massive crystal LED installation in the Atlantic World Gallery that focuses on Black Atlantic interconnections.
Aside from these core displays, the museum will host two to three temporary exhibitions a year in its rotating gallery space. The first of these exhibitions, Follow the North Star is slated to open next spring, and will consider the history of African-American “literal and figurative” mobility in society, according to the museum’s website.
Visitors interested in tracing their familial roots and discovering unknown ancestral connections can also explore the IAAM’s genealogy library in the Center for Family History. The library will house digital versions of historical photos, marriage and military records, and other archival resources.
Outdoors, the museum will feature a memorial garden designed by landscape architect and MacArthur “Genius Grant” recipient Walter Hood. Described as “gardens with a garden,” the free public space will weave art and natural elements together with site-specific installations, an infinity reflection pool, and plentiful fauna in commemoration of African ancestors and in recognition of the wharf’s historical significance.
Depending on the visitors’ place of residence (in-state or out-of-state), adult tickets for the museum range from $11.95 to $19.95. For youth tickets, which apply to children ages six to 16, and for senior tickets for adults 62 years and older, prices range from $5.96 to $9.95. The museum also offers military discounts and accepts SNAP/EBT.
Source: Hyperallergic.com