On June 6 2020 the Poe Museum was taken over by seven local artists from Mending Walls RVA! Due to an over-abundance of caution, the Poe Museum executed a standard emergency response plan and boarded up the museum last week. Inspired by the recent political activism in the community, museum leadership reached out to local artists to create something meaningful and beautiful on the boards now over the windows of the Old Stone House, the oldest residence in the city of Richmond and part of the Poe Museum complex. This has led to the exciting partnership between Poe Museum and Mending Walls RVA. The theme of the  installation is “We Need To Talk” and it features artists of different cultural backgrounds working together through public art to fuel connections and empathy to help start the tough conversations.

“This exhibit represents our hope that we can all address the pain and inequities of racism until it is eliminated, evermore,” explains Aaron-Paula Thompson, Executive Director at the Poe Museum. “We are using this opportunity as our invitation to be part of the dialog that needs to happen to help us all heal.”