FreedomEx

FreedomEx forms part of a larger series of direct-carved gypsum panel works that sample and remix various signs, symbols, and imagery from the artist’s local neighborhood in South Central Los Angeles. Inspired partly by the architecture and symbolism of ancient Egypt and also, the strategies and aesthetics of Afrofuturism and 1970s funk, Halsey draws upon her self-compiled visual community archive to produce these complex compositions, with their combination of sharply incised details and raised reliefs. Halsey reclaims the visual grammar of the Egyptian hieroglyph as a tool for archiving, documenting, and commemorating the people and places that constitute her community. For Halsey, this work operates on a level beyond sculpture, existing as an architectural prototype—one that could inform the wall surface of an imagined, currently unrealized, built structure—thus reflecting her broader architectural visions and future ambitions for direct community activism.