Right at the end of June, we organized photo shoots in Marmet and Clothier, West Virginia, as part of our Courage in the Hollers public monuments project with Monument Lab. We brought a professional lighting rig and some costume details to both communities, and in a short time everyone had tried out a variety of poses. Critically, we had a lot of fun!

These photos are the crucial next step in the monuments project: the folks you see here, community members from both towns and including current and retired UMWA union coal miners, have been an integral part of our community design process since the beginning. Now, the silhouettes we’ll be creating from these photos will become the actual monuments, soon to be laser cut from Cor-Ten steel. Each individual silhouette will join a group as they “march” forward to the Battle of Blair Mountain. Maybe it’s a lot of pressure knowing that your figure will be committed to a metal monument, visible for generations to come, but these folks were up for it!

Check out our teams below, and some process shots from our photo shoots…

Marmet, West Virginia

Clothier, West Virginia