ATLANTA, G.A. — Following the Route of the 1961 Freedom Rides, a weeklong national tour of a memorial hologram replaced where confederate statues once stood.
Change.Org and George Floyd Foundation created “ A monumental Change: The George Floyd Hologram Memorial Project.” This hologram was showcased in a different southern state each night.
Change.Org’s Media manager, Alaina Curry, said the organization strategically picked Richmond, Virginia, as the first spot because it was the capital of the confederacy.
“We really wanted to reflect the 1961 freedom rides and the route that starts in Richmond and goes through North Carolina, Georgia and Alabama,” Curry said.
Curry said on Change.org there were many petitions on the removal of confederate monuments, and decided that was something that needed to be focused on.
Curry said with George Floyd’s petition being one of the biggest and fastest growing petitions on the site, they wanted to see how they could keep the conversation going.
“It really started as a conversation. What is like the craziest thing we could think of,” Curry said.
George Floyd’s family had their own private viewing of the hologram in Richmond, Virginia.
Curry said they really wanted to create a moment for the family that’ll take their breathe away.
“They didn’t really get a time to grieve because they had to jump into social action, advocacy, and activist,” Curry said. “They didn’t ask to do this, but they felt like it was their responsibility.”
“ We wanted take this conversation to these places of deep racist history, the Richmonds, the Alabamas, all this deep history of confederacy and we wanted to show and commemorate this is just not about George Floyd. This is about Black lives and we want to continue this conversation,” Curry said.
Curry said the response from the community has varied. Some thought it was amazing and others spoke out against it.
“Even for the Alabama stop we choose not to reveal the location, for the safety of our crew,” Curry said.
Friday night the tour stopped in Atlanta, Georgia, at the Decatur Square.
“I think that it’s really powerful to stand in physical support of someone whose not physically here anymore,” said Adan Bean , who visited the memorial that night.
Curry said the message of this project is to keep fighting for human rights and racial justice.
Curry said George Floyd stands as a symbol for all these other Brown and Black boys and girls; men and women.
Curry said there hope is to challenge the question of why are there still confederate monuments around the nation, when nothing positive came out of the confederacy.
Curry said Monday is a recap and a call to keep going and to keep fighting.
