Artist Ren Davidson Seward (with sunglasses) mingles with the crowd at the unveiling of “A Memorial Field” at the John Brown Farm State Historic Site in Lake Placid on May 9, in observance of the 223rd anniversary of the birth of the abolitionist. (Provided photo — Nancie Battaglia)

LAKE PLACID — Artist Ren Davidson Seward unveiled her newest outdoor exhibit, “A Memorial Field: Spiraling Round the Promise of the Right to Vote,” at the John Brown Farm State Historic Site on Tuesday, May 9, the abolitionist’s birthday.

Brown was born in 1800 and died on Dec. 2, 1859, after being hanged for raiding the arsenal in Harpers Ferry, Virginia (now part of West Virginia). Brown is buried at the farm outside the village of Lake Placid.

In 2020, Seward installed her first Memorial Field for Black Lives following the death of George Floyd and the “Black Lives Matter” protests around the nation. The exhibit featured small placards planted in the ground with the names of unarmed Black men and woman who were killed in the U.S. by law enforcement officials and others.

A Memorial Field circles the John Brown statue in the greenspace in the middle of the round driveway.

The May 9 event and the more formal John Brown Day services on Saturday, May 13 are held to commemorate Black freedom and abolitionist history in the Adirondacks, connect our history with current human rights issues, and celebrate artists and the arts that bring us into meaningful conversation with our past and with one another.

The new Memorial Field exhibit is seen on Tuesday, May 9 before the outdoor exhibit’s unveiling at the John Brown Farm State Historic Site in Lake Placid. (News photo — Andy Flynn)

On Tuesday evening, choreographer Tiffany Rea-Fisher will screen her dance film, “Geography of Grace,” at the Lake Placid Center for the Arts. Inspired by the 1846 “scheme of justice and benevolence” to secure voting rights for Black men in New York state, “Geography of Grace” was filmed on site at the Brown family homestead. A conversation with Rea-Fisher, filmmaker Moti Margolin and John Brown Lives! Executive Director Martha Swan was held before the screening. Rea-Fisher is the director of the Adirondack Diversity Initiative.

John Brown Day will be observed from 2 to 4 p.m. on Saturday, May 13 and will be dedicated to the award-winning novelist Russell Banks, who died in January of this year. It was his 1998 novel, “Cloudsplitter,” that revived popular interest in John Brown. Banks, the late Noel Ignatiev and others sounded the call in 1999 to “those who share the vision of a country without racial walls” to gather at the John Brown Farm to renew the abolitionist’s legacy.

“It’s not an exaggeration to say that Russell revived John Brown Day on May 9, 1999, after a decade or more had lapsed since the last organized pilgrimage,” Swan said. “When we gather this year, he will be in our collective hearts, with love and gratitude and a sense of profound loss, too.”

The John Brown Day event will be followed by a ticketed reception from 5 to 7 p.m. at Cascade Welcome Center, Route 73. Reception tickets are $40 per person.

For more information or to reserve reception tickets, email info@johnbrownlives.org or call 518-744-7112.

The tradition of pilgrimage to lay a wreath on Brown’s grave was started in 1922 by Black Philadelphians Dr. Jesse Max Barber and Dr. T. Spotuas Burwell to honor, as Barber put it, “this great friend of the race.” Every May, well into the 1980s, groups organized by the John Brown Memorials Association traveled from Philadelphia, New York City, Chicago, and elsewhere to the Brown homestead to keep his memory alive.