The City of Alexandria’s Office of the Arts will host a reception with Richmond-based artist Sandy Williams IV on Oct. 7 from 6:30 to 8 p.m. at the Torpedo Factory Art Center.
The event takes place in the Overlook Room, 105 N. Union St., third floor, Room 325. Remarks begin at 7 p.m.
Williams has been selected to create the next Time & Place public art project, part of Alexandria’s commemoration of the 250th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence.
According to the Office of the Arts,
Time and Place 2026 will be part of Alexandria’s efforts to commemorate the 250th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence. The United States, Virginia, and Alexandria are celebrating this through programs that reflect on the founding of the country, the democratic experiment, and the future of the nation.
The City’s Public Art Program will invite an artist to create a visually compelling temporary public art that reflects on the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence and what the ideas of this document mean for today and the future. The artist will look at how the nation has been created over time and how people are continuing to work toward a nation that lives up to the ideals stated in our founding document.
At the reception, Williams will share examples of past work and discuss their interest in the project.
Williams is an interdisciplinary artist, filmmaker, and professor whose art practice studies the vernacular of time as it exists across cultural landscapes, personal experiences, and as a unit of measurement. Their approach to public art is sensitive to the contextual histories that inform a specific region, creating space in the archive for disenfranchised memories and participatory experiences.
Williams holds a bachelor’s degree from the University of Virginia and a master’s degree in sculpture and extended media from Virginia Commonwealth University. They are assistant professors of art at the University of Richmond and recipients of the 2024 Joan Mitchell Fellowship, the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts Fellowship, and the New York Community Trust Van Lier Fellowship.
Their work has been featured in The New York Times, New York Magazine, The Washington Post, Hyperallergic, and BBC.
Time & Place features curated exhibitions of temporary public art projects that examine aspects of the city’s history. The inaugural exhibition in 2017 featured works by artists Lauren Adams, Stewart Watson, and Sheldon Scott, which were recognized by the Public Art Network’s Year in Review as one of the most exemplary projects completed that year.
For more information about the Time & Place public art series, visit alexandriava.gov/PublicArt.
