Artist: Ashleigh Coleman

Project: A Cloud of Witness

Description: In January 2016, the Mississippi River flooded the disincorporated town of Rodney, Mississippi. Rodney, once so successful it was nearly named the state’s capitol, is now dismissed as a ghost town. For Ashleigh Coleman, the eerie, regal church buildings, ever out of place among the encroaching tangle of vines and trees, seemed alien once touched by the muddy floodwaters. Hebrews 12:1 reads: “Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles.” Coleman's project, A Cloud of Witness, asks how much pain has this land born witness to? What scars—and what joys—do these buildings still hold?