Sonya Clark’s Unraveling: The Work Is The Work

an over the shoulder photo between two light skinned black women as they unravel a confederate flag by hand, as it hangs on a gallery wall. the vertical threads dangle down to show their progress. this is how sonya clark's artwork unraveling is depicted in the collection database of the nasher museum of art at duke university, as a process and activity rather than a static state of unraveling
Sonya Clark, Unraveling, 2015, 70 x 36 in. [sic], cotton confederate battle flag, ed. 10, acquired in 2021, via nasher.duke.edu

When I saw Sonya Clark’s Unraveling (2015) at Duke’s Nasher Museum a few years ago, I did not know she started the project of unraveling a confederate flag on April 9th, 2015, the 15oth anniversary of the confederacy’s surrender.

And I did not know until just now, while making this post inspired by Michael Lobel’s Bluesky post about Unraveling and Unraveled, the work where the flag has been reduced to three piles of red, white, and blue thread, that Unraveling is from an edition of 10, and that the Nasher’s is listed as “State: 4.”

And I love that the Nasher’s collection photo of the work is of people doing the work of unraveling. And if “State: 4” is a measure of how far along the flag is at the moment, fine. But I really hope the edition is not ten flags in various artful states of unraveling, depending on how not racist your acquisitions committee thinks they are.

Sonya Clark, Unraveling and Unraveled [sonyaclark]