‘A Campus Divided’ archive
I worked with historian Riv-Ellen Prell and the University of Minnesota to make an unknown and incendiary public history accessible to a broad audience. Thousands have visited this site, which documents abuses by University administration and emerging student activist movements. These discoveries have instigated an ongoing community conversation around institutional memory.
Web development by Blue Jack Studio
My role: Concept, information architecture, UX, visual design
Bold, intense colors and a disorienting use of archival imagery highlight the exhibit's urgency and contemporary relevance.
The site’s design posed a unique challenge: the archival documents require significant explanation to render their incendiary content legible to readers.
In response, essays and archival documents live side-by-side, each providing necessary context for the other. Through a densely linked structure, readers move fluidly between narrative and document.
A subject-driven data structure reinforces the exhibit’s themes, and lets visitors use them to filter and navigate.
The exhibit asks visitors how the University should remember those who created—and resisted—its racist and antisemitic policies.
In response, student groups circulated a petition with nearly 5,000 signatures calling for several major buildings to be renamed. A University-convened task force is currently considering recommendations.
