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While working at Mural Arts Philadelphia, an organization based inside the former home and studio of acclaimed painter Thomas Eakins, interdisciplinary artist Mary Enoch Elizabeth Baxter unearthed a disturbing piece of the past online. Researching in the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts' digital archive, she discovered photographs from 1882 of a young Black girl, nude and vulnerable, taken by Eakins in the very room where she stood. As a survivor of abuse, Baxter felt a profound responsibility to the child in the frames — a feeling that intensified when she learned that this collection of photos were the most downloaded images in the online archive. While they have since been removed, Baxter felt an urgency to protect the child.

“I just felt like this call to action,” Baxter said.”How could I make this critical intervention that could restore this broken timeline?”

This ultimately resulted in her own collection, “Consecration to Mary,” which directly addresses the Eakins photographs. Baxter reimagines the historical images by inserting her own figure as a protector for the exploited child. She will bring this collection to the �������� for her own showing titled, “Reparenting the Figure: Temporal paradox, grief and repair.” Her exhibition opens with a reception on Thursday, Sept. 18, at 5 p.m. in Kittredge Gallery and runs through Oct. 18.

Baxter is an award-winning artist, writer, and cultural worker known for tackling complex social histories. Her activism comes from her own experiences as a survivor who endured the foster care and juvenile justice systems. These real-world experiences, along with later giving birth to her son while shackled to a hospital bed during her incarceration, inform her practice, which she says embodies resilience, care, and community-centeredness.

“Art allows people to come to the work at whatever point of reference they can enter,” Baxter explained. “There's not a lot of bureaucracy or barriers to entry.”

Baxter's work has been exhibited both nationally and internationally at venues including MoMA PS1, the African American Museum of Philadelphia, Frieze LA, and the Brooklyn Museum. She is also the recipient of many prestigious fellowships and awards, including a 2021 Frieze Impact Prize award and a 2023 Soros Justice Fellowship. In February 2024, she was granted a Pennsylvania Governor’s Pardon by Josh Shapiro, honoring her work in the arts and her 17-year commitment to communal healing and advocacy.

“My art has been a way to understand the complexities of these systems of control,” she said. “Helping me to understand, but then also process and ultimately heal.”

In addition to her art show, Baxter has expressed her creativity through film, with her musical documentary, Ain't I a Woman. The film spotlighted the trauma that comes from giving birth while imprisoned, and ultimately became a policy tool to help introduce the Dignity for Incarcerated Women Act, which bans shackling during childbirth in U.S. prisons.

Her residency is supported by Puget Sound’s Crime, Law, and Justice Studies program and a grant from The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation. The $1.3 million grant funds the university’s groundbreaking project, “Reimagining Justice and Carceral Systems through the Humanities.” This initiative employs a humanities approach to shed light on the experiences of those most affected by legal systems and expands the Crime, Law, and Justice Studies program. A team of faculty led by Prof. Tanya Erzen, along with Professors Greta Austin, Amy Fisher, Sara Freeman, Jennifer Neighbors, Renee Sims, Andrew Gomez, and Trishna Senapaty, will develop new courses exploring the intersection of humanities, criminal legal systems, and social justice.

“Most people think of criminology when they hear Crime, Law and Justice, but we created our program to provide students with multiple perspectives on these systems,” Erzen said. “We want students to learn about crime, law and justice through art, history, and theater, too. This will be a fantastic opportunity for students to talk with a nationally recognized artist who has direct experience of carceral systems, and who is creating powerful art and films about the experiences of women and girls in prisons while emphasizing resilience and healing.”

While at the university, Baxter will also spend time meeting with students, discussing the ethics of storytelling, and sharing her story. Ultimately, she hopes visitors leave her exhibition understanding that vulnerability is a source of strength.

“It's okay to lay it all out there on the line, especially if it's in service of your personal development and healing,” she said. “Visitors should expect to see resiliency in all its forms.”