You Shall Know Them By Their Deeds (2025)

"You shall know them by their deeds" reproduces pages of the colonial-era land deeds of Gustavus Brown, a Scottish physician from Dalkeith who settled in my hometown of Port Tobacco, Maryland, and grew wealthy from the proceeds of the labour of enslaved Africans on his extensive tobacco plantations. The deeds have been sandblasted onto multiple layers of glass, obscuring an image of enslaved people working a tobacco farm.

In Scotland, Brown is most remembered for advertising a reward for the capture of Ann, an enslaved woman he brought from Port Tobacco to Scotland. Nothing else is known about Ann.

You Shall Know Them By Their Deeds
Layers of enamelled glass, paint
47h x 110w x 9d cm (x3)/47h x 33w x 9d cm (each)
2025