Before. Then. Now.

A series of 8 black and white photographs taken on a medium format camera with descriptive exhibit labels, showing areas that had once been inhabited by the Nacotchtank tribe in the present day DC area. The idea is to play off the way that many anthropological photographers captured their subjects decades ago by framing our current moment in the same way. After coming up with and latching onto the creative concept, I wrestled with how these photographs could be used in an educational setting. The vision is for this work to be used in a workshop or lesson on speculative play. Having struggled with speculative play early in the semester, my hope is that I have designed a project that can help students visualize, retell, and speculate about a fully decolonized future, using visual mediums to anchor their thoughts and ideations.