George Floyd
In Memoriam.
Duluth Juneteenth March & George Floyd Square, 2020
I grew up between Kenya and Minneapolis — and for a stretch of my early adult life, Duluth was home. My college years were spent in that city on the shore of Lake Superior. When Juneteenth 2020 arrived, just weeks after George Floyd was killed in the city I grew up in, I went back with my camera. Looking back now, I see the Duluth community choosing to come together and heal on that day. I also went to George Floyd Square in Minneapolis — to stand where it all began, and to witness how his people were still holding that corner.
For the Freedom of Black Lives
Duluth was home to me for years — late nights studying, early mornings by the lake, a city that felt like its own world. On Juneteenth 2020, just weeks after George Floyd was killed in the city I grew up in, the Duluth community came together. Not just in protest, but in something closer to healing. This was the day I understood why I needed to be there with a camera.
The First Group Gathers
Bayfront Festival Park was one of two starting points for the march. I remember standing there watching the crowd form — people who drove in, people who walked, all carrying the same weight. Signs went up. Voices carried out over the water. Duluth, the city that shaped my early adult years, was showing up in a way I hadn’t seen before.
Remembering Together
The second group gathered at the Clayton Jackson McGhie Memorial — a site that already carries a hundred years of Duluth’s own grief. Three Black men were lynched here in 1920. On Juneteenth 2020, the community stood at that same ground again. Some things in this country don’t close. They just get named again, in a different century, by people who are still paying the cost.
2,000 Strong
Both groups converged and moved through downtown Duluth together. Looking back at these images now, I’m still struck by how many people came out — over two thousand in a city that isn’t large. The streets of the place that shaped my early adult life were full of people who refused to let this moment pass unseen.
Speeches & Silence
At City Hall, the march became something else — ceremony, grief, and community all held at once. Speeches, performances, and a moment of silence. Looking back at that afternoon, what stays with me is how Duluth found a way to turn what hurt into something collective. Something that felt, at least for that day, like it could hold.
38th & Chicago
Back in Minneapolis — the city where I grew up, where my family is — I went to the square at 38th and Chicago. Performers were there. The community was there. George Floyd’s baby was there. Standing in the place where it all began, I tried to make photographs that could hold what I was feeling. These are them.
