In our current political moment, it is next to impossible to ignore the harmful effects of wealth inequality, White supremacy, and settler colonialism within our country and around the world. Yet, this hasn’t always been the case. For decades, most White Americans have ignored the ways racial privilege perpetrated injustices—even those of us who have decried the immorality of inequities.

 

Now You See It, Now You… seeks to make the invisible impacts of privilege visible through fantastical, metaphorical sculptures, installations, and performance art. The exhibition’s primary metaphor alludes to another historical moment where inequities between the ruling and working classes threatened to upend the social order—18th century France.

 

In 18th century France, inequality between the working people and the royal nobles was vast. Revolutionaries desiring political change saw Queen Marie Antoinette’s extravagant lifestyle and conspicuous consumption as an embodiment of the extreme inequities. Additionally, she demonstrated little understanding of or sympathy for the plight of her own people. As legend tells it, she even dismissably said, “Let them eat cake,” when asked what people who could no longer afford bread should eat. Marie Antoinette’s positionality and privilege blinded her from seeing the suffering right outside her door—suffering that was exacerbated by her own actions.

 

Nora Howell uses Marie Antoinette’s infamous obliviousness as a foil for inspecting her own role as a White person working in Black communities. After over a decade working for Baltimore based nonprofits, Howell realized that despite her best intentions, racial consciousness, and social justice framework, her positionality as a White person could still inflict harm. Although the exhibition comes out of her own reflections, Howell recognizes her experiences are part of a larger story. For centuries, the privileged have refused to see how their own actions perpetuate harm—especially when they see themselves as “saving” the afflicted.

 

Howell invites the viewer to join her in exploring how seemingly mundane actions can wield power and ask, “Now You See it, Now You…?”