How Do We Remember? 

Memories are deeply embedded in the physical structures of modern day society — our neighborhoods, our laws, our monuments, our buildings — but those memories are often sculpted and built into those structures by a privileged few. How have their perspectives shaped the enduring stories of our history and visions of the past?

You’re Welcome is a three-part installation and dynamic intervention that exposes the histories and narratives of the land occupied by the University of Michigan and UMMA’s neoclassical building, Alumni Memorial Hall. A large-scale commission from artist Cannupa Hanska Luger on the exterior of UMMA’s building asks the campus and community to reconsider the memories molded into the Museum’s stone — the perspectives that shaped those traditions and the stories that remain unseen in our facade. This artistic interrogation dissects colonialist norms of monument-making, explores the roles of buildings in upholding selected cultural systems, and develops new forms of memorials that center Indigenous perspectives and collaboration to tell fuller stories and histories. 

Luger communicates stories of 21st-century Indigeneity, sovereignty, and anti-colonialism while offering critical cultural analysis through deep engagements with materials, environments, and communities. In addition to the exterior commission, a gallery exhibition places Luger’s works of art in conversation with objects in UMMA’s collection, allowing for discussion and thinking on long histories of collecting practices, environmental degradation, and the afterlife of colonialism. And, a monument classroom from nonprofit public art and history studio Monument Lab invites the community to come together and examine how historic structures on the University of Michigan’s campus uphold social and cultural systems and narratives.  

Lead support for this project is provided by Teiger Foundation, the U-M Office of the Provost, the U-M Office of the President, Erica Gervais Pappendick and Ted Pappendick, the U-M Marsal Family School of Education, the U-M Institute for the Humanities, Michigan Humanities, and the U-M Arts Initiative. Additional generous support is provided by Melissa Kaish and Jonathan Dorfman.