Rose Arcade: LET THE SUN SET ON YOU
A solo commission by Malcolm Peacock
Arrive at the junction of Beechwood Drive and Swann Drive
by 6pm Monday, October 3rd
Druid Hill Park, Baltimore, Maryland
Longer wavelengths, green and blue fade, only orange and red are visible. The sun, like a clementine peel resting on the edge of your knee casts a fading glow across the sky. In circles for one day a year night becomes day — the sun never setting or rising.
Embodying. Presencing. A field cooing and heaving at a whisper. A game of the palm. Our bodies traverse a landscape still barbed and torn. An enduring reality, tense and tenuous ground.
~~~
Thomas Cummings was a 13 year old boy who drowned in the shadow of the Hanover Street bridge on August 5, 1953. Unable to swim in the whites only pool in his neighborhood, he sought out water where he could be at peace. His death led to the integration of Pool No. 2 in Druid Hill Park, the first municipal pool for Blacks in the United States. Pool No. 2 opened in 1921 and closed in 1956. It was memorialized by artist Joyce J. Scott in 1999 as “Memorial Pool” but is unknown to many in the city.
Tennis courts neighbor the pool and were the site of the 1948 integrated tennis match protest that led to arrests and a greater push for racial equality. The courts were also the home of the first American Tennis Association national championships, where both Althea Gibson and Arthur Ashe played. Unfortunately, this traditionally Black area of Druid Hill Park still remains without lighting at night. Forcing regular attendees to end their evenings early, still residents of a sundown town.
