COLLABORATOR
During their graduate studies, Lewis discovered the discipline of Public Humanities—an avenue for bringing research out of the institution and into the community. They fell in love with the collaborative methodology of the field as well as its emphasis on accessibility.
They started working in archives during their Ph.D. coursework. For instance, under Dr. Felicia Jamison, they learned how to gather information from all sorts of artifacts. For their class project "Uncovering Oxmoor," Lewis wrote biographies about individuals enslaved at Oxmoor Farm from physical and digitized documents from the Filson Historical Society.
These experiences inspired Lewis to organize their own Public Humanities initiatives. Foregrounding their passion for print, they implemented collaborative work around the craft in the classroom (Catalogs in Cyan), in the community (CeLOUbrate Print), and in the archives (Line Byline).
Throughout all of their community engaged scholarship, Lewis marries thoughtful research with community accessibility, incorporating local voices within the process as well as the final product.
NOTE: WHILE LIVE, THIS PAGE IS STILL UNDER CONSTRUCTION.
YOUR PATIENCE IS APPRECIATED WHILE I CONTINUE TO WORK ON ITS CONTENT AND ACCESSIBILITY FEATURES.
COMMUNITY PROGRAM
CELOUBRATE
PRINT
Each spring, free pop-up woodcut workshops are offered around Louisville, giving local community members the tools and knowledge to carve their own woodblock. They can then return to the Portland Museum to print it with a steamroller at CeLOUbrate Print, Louisville's annual community printmaking festival, which includes booths from local artists, hands-on art activities, and printmaking exhibitions.
COMING SOON:
ARTWORK
CATALOGS
IN CYAN
This tapestry of microfiche, catalog cards, and cyanotype photograms ruminates on changing methods of documentation and archival access, particularly in response to censorship and systemic dictations of whose histories are and are not deemed worthy of preservation.
The installation was executed as a collaboration between Lewis's HUM 151 and Sarah Jane Castellon's ART 381 students.
COMING SOON:
RESEARCH PROJECT
NOT YET
ALWAYS BEEN
In Dr. Jennifer Sichel's "Queer Curating" course, students collaboratively curated an archival exhibition of queer artifacts on Louisville's local history from the University of Louisville's Williams-Nichols Collection.
Lewis designed the 67-page exhibition catalog and led a binding workshop for the curatorial team to hand sew each little magazine in Japanese stab binding.
