Artist-in-Residence Shelley Miller shares her current research on how rural New England residents contributed to the plantation economy.

This hybrid talk is free and open to the public.

Speaker: Shelley Miller, Artist-in-Residence Fellow, Summer 2025

Moderator: Dr. Charmaine A. Nelson, Provost Professor of Art History & Founding Director, Slavery North

Lecture: The Economics of Complicity: How Rural New England Profited from the Plantation Economy

Lecture abstract:

Shelley Miller shares her research on how rural New England residents contributed to the plantation economy through farming and cottage industries such as the making of garments, shoes and palm-leaf hats destined to be worn by the enslaved on southern and island plantations. She will discuss her primary research findings, including family archive papers and material objects in local historic house museums, and provide overviews about how she uses her sugar azulejo works to comment on sugar’s long history of colonization and slavery.

Bio:

Shelley Miller is a Montreal-based visual artist whose practice spans public art, ephemeral street interventions, and community engagement. Renowned for her innovative use of sugar as a medium, her work investigates themes of desire, consumer culture, and the colonial legacies embedded in sugar production. Miller critiques colonial power structures through intricate sugar tile murals that reinterpret traditional azulejos. She holds an MFA from Concordia University and has exhibited internationally, including in Brazil and India. Her practice has been supported by numerous grants from the Canada Council for the Arts and the Québec Arts Council.