Carrboro ArtsCenter continues Hidden Voices series
by Colin Campbell
Carrboro Commons Co-Editor
Most locals don’t know that the building that houses Carrboro’s Main Street Gallery was once home to the Hollywood Theater, a movie theater that catered to black patrons.
Photo by Colin Campbell
But a new exhibit at the ArtsCenter aims to change that. The exhibit, which opened Feb. 8, depicts more than a hundred years of black history and culture in the Carrboro and Chapel Hill area.
The community mapping project, which is titled “Because We’re Still Here (And Moving),” is the result of a collaborative effort by UNC-Chapel Hill students and local teens to collect oral histories.
“The stories were passing with the people,” said Lynden Harris, founder of the ArtsCenter’s Hidden Voices series, who organized the project. “People drive down Franklin Street and have no idea that it used to be an African-American community.”
In addition to the exhibit, local actors will present a performance of the collected stories Feb. 15 at 10 a.m., 11:30 a.m. and 8 p.m. at the ArtsCenter. The show was written by Harris and is directed by Kathryn Williams.
The exhibit includes photos of local blacks such as James “Bubba” Norwood. Norwood formed a band at Lincoln High School, the local black high school during segregation. He went on to play drums with Tina Turner, the Monkees and James Brown.
Artists also created several collages that include everything from a program for commencement ceremonies at Lincoln High to black-and-white snapshots of local residents from decades ago.
A wall map on display at the ArtsCenter features photos and stories of historical neighborhoods and places in Chapel Hill and Carrboro. Visitors to the exhibit can add to the map with stories and places significant to them.
“It’s really interesting to see places I’ve seen before from a new perspective,” said Dee Lutz, a Durham resident who attended the opening.
Local actor Solomon Gibson, who will appear in Friday’s performance, was surprised to find a photo of himself on the map. The old photo is from a play about Thomas Jefferson that Gibson acted in at the ArtsCenter in 1988.
“I was the first African American to play Thomas Jefferson in the entire country,” Gibson said.
Gibson said he has been impressed by the extent to which the black community has thrived despite facing adversity.
“It’s always interesting to find out just how much African-Americans flourished,” he said. “It’s gratifying to know it wasn’t all whips and chains and people starving in the streets.”
But Gibson added that many of the positive aspects of life in the past have been forgotten.
“A lot of substantive things have been lost through history,” he said.
And the project aims to keep that local history from being lost, long after the exhibit closes. A walking tour map is being distributed and stickers will be placed around town to inform people where old neighborhoods and landmarks once were. The tour takes visitors to the sites of places like the area’s first silent movie theater and the Quaker school for children of freed slaves.
“The map includes a lot of stories that have been shared by a lot of kind people,” Harris said.
