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International, local artist, Sandra Hansen, is announcing the completion of the monumental piece, “The Emmett Till Memorial Triptych.” It can be seen at Fountain Street Church (24 Fountain Street Northeast, Grand Rapids, MI 49503-3191 (616) 459-8386) during the ArtPrize Festival., September 21 to October 9 in Grand Rapids.
The Emmett Till Memorial Triptych, stands over nine feet tall and eight feet wide, and tells the story, of the torture and murder of fourteen year old, African American, Emmett Till on August 28, 1955. A Chicagoan, Emmett was visiting family in Mississippi when his cousins dared him to whistle at a white woman. He was then kidnapped, severely beaten, shot dead, and thrown in the Tallahatchie River.
The Emmett Till Memorial Triptych references a Christian church altar piece. Instead of showing Christ dying for the sins of all humans, Emmett Till is shown as a victim of a lynching whose death brings life to the Civil Rights Movement. The left panel is a Crucifixion scene with Emmett’s lifeless body, weighted down with a cotton gin fan, being thrown into the Tallahatchie River. In the center panel, his mother, Mamie Bradley weeps in a pose similar to Michaelangelo’s Pieta. Ms. Bradley refused to let her son be forgotten and instead held an open casket funeral, attended by up to 50,000 mourners. The right panel shows the Resurrection scene with the river turning into the leaders and participants of the Civil Rights Movement. The backsides of the two side panels have full life paintings of Rosa Parks and Martin Luther King Jr. (not shown) welcoming people into the Civil Rights Movement on the dawning of a new day.
This is the third year for ArtPrize, which has been wildly popular, with expectations of 500,000 people attending this year. There is a large people’s choice award of $250,000. This year there is also a juried competition.
