Landscapes of Exclusion: A Screening and Book Discussion

William E. O’Brien is a Professor of Environmental Studies and Chair of Natural Sciences and Mathematics in the Wilkes Honors College of Florida Atlantic University. He had previously been Chair ofHumanities and Social Sciences there. A geographer by training, a field that links the social and natural, his work explores connections between race and environment, most recently regarding scenic park spaces. His book, Landscapes of Exclusion: State Parks and Jim Crow in the American South received the John Brinckerhoff Jackson Book Prize from the Foundation for Landscape Studies and the Leadership in History Award of Merit from the American Association for State and Local History. A northern New Jersey native, he holds degrees from Radford University and Virginia Tech in southwest Virginia.

Following a fifty-year career in architecture and construction, Arthur J. Clement now works as a preservation architect and architectural historian writing about the campus heritage and cultural landscapes of Historically Black Colleges and Universities, especially in the state of Georgia. He is also collaborating on a book project about the African American Architect, Philip G. Freelon (1953-2019).  

Ian Forster is a producer and director who specializes in documentaries about art and culture. He is the senior producer at Art21, a long-running and celebrated non-profit that produces documentaries about contemporary art. Forster has worked on six seasons of Art21’s PBS series Art in the Twenty-First Century. Most recently, he directed its “Everyday Icons” episode, which premiered nationally on PBS in April 2023. His films for Art21 have featured some ofthe world’s most notable contemporary artists, including Amy Sherald, Anish Kapoor, Kara Walker, Sarah Sze, Julie Mehretu, Barbara Kruger, and many more.