Catalog Entry from If These Walls Could Talk Exhibit, Neill-Cochran House 2020:

In 2018 I went with a group of artists on a short tour of Birmingham and Montgomery Alabama to see the National Memorial for Peace and Justice, a powerful commemoration of the lynching of black people during the Jim Crow era. The memorial is beyond words. We also drove by the church in Montgomery where MLK, Jr., served, and also passed by the modest middle-class home he shared with Coretta, now a museum. In 1955, King’s work with civil rights was gaining steam and he got not only pushback, he also received bodily threats. He despaired about the power of love in solving social problems. Late one night, on January 27, 1956, he received yet another threatening phone call and couldn’t sleep. He wrote about this in Stride Toward Freedom: “It seemed all my fears had come down on me at once. I had reached the saturation point. I got out of bed and began to walk the floor. Finally I went to the kitchen and heated a pot of coffee. I was ready to give up. With my cup of coffee sitting untouched before me I tried to think of a way to move out of the picture without appearing a coward. In this state of exhaustion, when my courage had all but gone, I decided to take my problem to God. With my head in my hands, I bowed over the kitchen table and prayed aloud. The words I spoke to God that midnight are still vivid in my memory: ‘I am here taking a stand for what I believe is right. But now I am afraid. The people are looking to me for leadership, and if I stand before them without strength and courage, they too will falter. I am at the end of my powers. I have nothing left. I’ve come to the point where I can’t face it alone.’ Then at that moment I experienced the presence of the Divine as I had never experienced Him before. It seemed as though I could hear the quiet reassurance of an inner voice saying, ‘Stand up for righteousness, stand up for truth: and God will be at your side forever.’ Almost at once my fears began to go. My uncertainty disappeared. I was ready to face anything.” Three nights later, white suprematists tossed a bomb onto the Kings’ front porch. He was attending a church meeting, but his wife and baby were at home, fortunately uninjured. King credited his recent religious experience with giving him the strength to face the aftermath of this incident. An angry crowd gathered at his home and he convinced them to meet hate with love. It could’ve been the darkest night in Montgomery’s history, but it closed in a majestic demonstration of non- violence. How I wish I had gone into the King house museum. Later I found photos online of their kitchen. A stainless steel coffee pot sat on the stove, a coffee set of turquoise Melamine on the kitchen table, a classic chrome dinette from the 50s. On eBay I found similar items. I recalled King’s writings about those who had had strong influence on him, beginning with Moses and the Exodus from Egypt. In my mind, King’s revelation was akin to Moses’ with the burning bush. I located a wild, abstract painting on that topic by an African-American named Beauford Delaney. It went onto the coffee pot. It appears to be boiling over, yet not consumed. King’s experience could be termed a call, a God-fueled beckoning to vocation. So, I named the porcelain piece MLK, Jr.’s Caffeinated Call. Other influences King credits—Gandhi, Harriet Tubman, and of course, Jesus—grace the other three pieces, also in imagery by contemporary people of color.