Des Moines-based multidisciplinary artist and activist Jordan Weber is an artist-in-residence in St. Louis through a collaborative project of the Pulitzer Arts Foundation and Washington University’s Center for the Study of Race, Ethnicity, and Equity (CRE2) and Sam Fox School of Design & Visual Arts. Weber’s residency centers on social and environmental justice, incarceration, and healing, with a specific focus on the Close the Workhouse campaign—a collaborative project that is dedicated to the closure of St. Louis’ Medium Security Institute (better known locally as the Workhouse); an end to wealth-based pretrial detention; and the reinvestment of the money used to unjustly incarcerate poor and Black people into rebuilding the most impacted communities in the city. During the residency, Weber will conduct field research in St. Louis, meeting with students and faculty at various sites in the city and connecting with community members to build partnerships in support of a public art project.
Jordan Weber (b. 1984) has exhibited at The Luminary, St. Louis, MO; White Box Gallery, New York; The Bemis Art Center, Omaha, NE; Des Moines Art Center, Des Moines, IA; Manifest Justice and No Gallery, Los Angeles; and Macalester College, St. Paul, MN. Weber is best known for a series of urban land remediation projects on vacant lots and his deconstructed police vehicles, which have been turned into community gardens. He has received numerous awards and fellowships, including the Joan Mitchell Award for Sculptors, Creative Capital NYC Award, A Blade of Grass fellowship NYC, Tanne Foundation Award, and the African American Leadership Forum Award. He is currently an artist in residence at the Walker Art Center in Minneapolis, MN.
