Collage artist Njaimeh Njie in East Liberty on April 7, 2025. (Photo by Vondre Clark/PublicSource)
Childhood memories of East Liberty in the 1990s and a century of archival material informed “Lifting Liberty” and deepened my commitment to bringing the past to the present.
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We were very lucky that our parents raised us in a Black community of artists, cultural workers, educators, blue collar folks and professionals of many kinds — largely anchored on the East End of Pittsburgh. They staged performances, art exhibitions, lectures, fashion shows and street festivals. It was an environment where there was always a kind word, a note of encouragement, and when needed, a loving correction. I look back fondly on those times.
Back then I didn’t realize that a lot of the people who were shaping my world had in fact come of age in and around East Liberty. Some of the same folks who were putting on programming at the Kingsley Center or in the auditorium of the Homewood Library had been influenced by the members of Musician’s Local No. 471, or logged hours at the Selma Burke Art Center. These people and spaces laid the groundwork for what would later become gathering spots like the Shadow Lounge and BOOM Concepts — Black-centered, progressive, creative spaces that have served as home away from home for so many.
It’s hard to overstate the importance of these third spaces, especially considering the fact that their lifespan has been so closely tied to generations of promises and pitfalls of redevelopment in East Liberty.
East Liberty’s history: rich with creation
This past fall, the Kelly Strayhorn Theater invited me to create an exhibition in conjunction with their upcoming symposium, “Owning Our Future: A Symposium on BIPOC Institutional Ownership.” The intention was to highlight a legacy of Black-led cultural spaces in East Liberty. The symposium is focused on how BIPOC and queer-led spaces locally and nationally can maintain their existence as gentrification reshapes the neighborhoods they call home. It’s an urgent convening highlighting the recurring disenfranchisement and displacement of Black, brown, disabled, queer and poor communities that continues to plague this country.
Collage artist Njaimeh Njie, of Pittsburgh, poses for portraits with some of her art in East Liberty on April 7. (Photos by Vondre Clark/PublicSource)
I built the “Lifting Liberty” exhibition upon three eras — before, during and after urban renewal, a mid-20th century policy that saw hundreds of poor and working-class Black and immigrant communities across the U.S. destroyed in order to build new infrastructure that often displaced the original populations. While urban renewal is a defining event in the history of East Liberty, the neighborhood is more than the narrative of its destruction and reshaping. I set out to create a body of work that explored the impact of generations of policy change on the neighborhood, while also celebrating the spaces that Black residents and community members have created amid the changes.
I used archival research, stories I’d heard and my own lived experiences to identify the spaces and periods to document in the exhibit, and aerial and street level images of East Liberty to establish a sense of place. References to historic Black print media, playbills and performance posters became the building blocks of collages that explore everyday life and everyday cultural spaces over the years in the neighborhood. Frame-by-frame they showcase Black folks in these reimagined East Liberty establishments, all in a moment of creative expression. By streamlining the visual language I aim to show the ways we’ve found to create, together, across space and time.
Making art in an inhospitable city
My research goes back roughly a century to the 1920s, when Black residents had a small enclave within the larger neighborhood. I combed through Historic Pittsburgh and the Pittsburgh Courier archives to find cultural sites from those days, but the search proved elusive. In the 1920s and 1930s, a space called Liberty Gardens came up, which was billed as East Liberty’s only Black ballroom. Still, I knew there had to be more clubs, bars, social halls and rent parties where people were meeting, where jazz was playing, and where dancing was happening. After all, Mary Lou Williams was dubbed the “Little Piano Girl of East Liberty.” She had to be playing that piano, somewhere.
The archive, or the institutional record, doesn’t always hold space for the types of places where the likes of Mary Lou Williams or any of the other Pittsburgh musical giants made their names. Those places too often go down with the memories of the folks who filled them out and made them what they were. I’m grateful for our Black press and for the work of Charles “Teenie” Harris. I’m also grateful for everyday archivists whose scrapbooks and family albums hold pieces of these stories, and whose stories are passed down to us so we have some understanding of what these places were. When we know that, we have an inkling of what can be.
Working my way toward the present, I eventually landed on nine spaces to highlight in the exhibition. By no means an exhaustive list, it’s a sampling of what Black communities have created in a city that is inhospitable to our very existence. I only learned of the Howe School of Dancing and the Hayes School of Music through research for this exhibition, but they laid the foundation for contemporary spaces like Sankofa Village and the Afro American Music Institute. Parties at Westray Plaza may have ended decades ago, but there are still functions, and we still gather. Systemic racism, classism and capitalism have for too long destroyed the buildings where we make community. Yet, the circle of cultural creation in Black Pittsburgh, and within Black East Liberty is not broken. We just have to dig a little to find the line.
Looking back helps me look forward
When “Lifting Liberty” opened, long-term residents and newer community members gathered together in the Kelly Strayhorn lobby. I heard stories about past spaces and people represented in the exhibit, and I heard stories of how people are experiencing East Liberty today. I thought back on the village that raised me with a deeper understanding that I’ve experienced only the latest versions of a neighborhood that has historically changed many times over. The history is bittersweet, but sharing space at the opening renewed my belief that we have a say in what lies ahead. As we look back, we move forward.
Collage artist Njaimeh Njie in East Liberty on April 7. (Photos by Vondre Clark/PublicSource)
We need to talk about the places we’ve inhabited and what we’ve made there because memory is a powerful vehicle for conversation. Conversation is a cornerstone of community, and we need that now as much as ever. Black folks have carved out spaces for ourselves through segregation, through urban renewal and through gentrification. There’s a precedent for creating in spite of the circumstances around us. I’m dreaming of a Pittsburgh where we will be able to create because of our circumstances. One where we’re all safe and have what we need. One where our living conditions and the socioeconomic landscape will nurture and inspire our creativity — not hinder it.
But we need more than just dreams. We have to keep making, together.
Disclosure: PublicSource is a media sponsor for “Owning Our Future.” Editors worked independently with Njaimeh Njie on this essay. PublicSource subscribes to the Institute for Nonprofit News standards of editorial independence.
Njaimeh Njie is a multimedia artist. You can learn more about her work at njaimehnjie.com.
“Lifting Liberty” is on display through May 31 at the Kelly Strayhorn Theater. “Owning Our Future: A Symposium on BIPOC Institutional Ownership,” runs from May 15 to May 18.
This article first appeared on PublicSource and is republished here under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.
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