Counteracting Censorship through Conceptual Creativity
The Queerative Spotlight // The Free Pages Project, by Alex Smith, documented by Charlie Champagne
This month, I re-connected with my friend Alex Jacobs to see how grad school had been treating them, and to learn more about their exciting thesis, The Free Pages Project - a nonprofit initiative fighting nationwide book-bans through conceptual & functional art.
Alex is originally from St. Louis, Missouri, and is currently enrolled in the LSU Art & Design Graduate Program for Sculpture. Their work currently focuses on the conceptual nature of identity, gender expression, and representation.
Photo by Charlie Champagne // Alex Jacobs / Louisiana State University
Q&A with Alex Jacobs
“So tell me more about what inspired this project?”
Alex: “In my work, I focus on the concepts of gender-identity, gender-expression, and representation. While I was trying to decide where to focus for my thesis project, I couldn’t help but notice the recent legislation of book-bans that have been popping up all over the United States — and in the realm of representation, these bans really hit home for me.
The idea really stemmed from listening to a podcast that mentioned Magnus Hirschfeld. He was a queer and jewish man, who was born in the 1800s. He was a sexologist and researcher, pre-Kinsey. When you see pictures of Nazis burning books, there were from his entire library. All of his documented queer oral histories and stories of queer culture had been lost. I see today’s current book bans as an extension of that same mechanism that consistently attempts to erase our stories & narratives — in an attempt to white-wash American history.”
“And it’s not just queer people, it’s people-of-color, women, etc. These people imposing these book bans just want some sanitized version of American history that they don’t have to feel bad about, when in reality, it’s much more colorful.”
Photo by Charlie Champagne // Alex Jacobs / Louisiana State University
Photo by Charlie Champagne // Alex Jacobs / Louisiana State University
“How have these feelings helped fuel and manifest the concept for The Free Pages Project?”
Alex: “In response to all of that stimuli, I started creating structures that could hold these banned books, similar to Little Book Libraries. I am currently wanting to use private spaces to house these unique and creative pop-up libraries to allow these books to be accessible to the public. If these stories are taken off shelves, then that representation disappears, especially in places where they are needed the most.”
Photo by Charlie Champagne // Alex Jacobs / Louisiana State University
Photo by Charlie Champagne // Alex Jacobs / Louisiana State University
Photo by Charlie Champagne // Alex Jacobs / Louisiana State University
Alex: “These legislative bodies and school boards, all seem to copy one-another. This is how they seem to spread before they become a national or federal rule, they pop-up in local governments. As small as a little town, county, or parish, and eventually spread across the entire state.
Charlie: Have you been keeping up with book-bans here in Louisiana?
Alex: Thankfully, Louisiana right now only has under 10 official challenged and banned books, but if I had to guess with the current state legislation, that may begin to increase within the next few years.”
Photo by Charlie Champagne // Alex Jacobs / Louisiana State University
Photo by Charlie Champagne // Alex Jacobs / Louisiana State University
Over 10,000 books were banned in public schools during the 2023-2024 school year, according to PEN America’s preliminary findings.
Photo by Charlie Champagne // Alex Jacobs / Louisiana State University
The Free Pages Project is dedicated to freedom of expression and the richness of diverse literature through our mission to counteract censorship. By constructing unique sculptural community libraries, we provide access to books banned in schools and community libraries across the United States.
Our commitment lies in fostering community engagement, activism, and literacy. We believe in the transformative power of diverse voices and stories, and through our innovative approach combining art and activism, we strive to educate, enlighten, and empower individuals and communities nationwide.
