David's Dream

David's Dream comprises several large stainless-steel disks and geometric shapes, along with an enlarged stainless-steel chain running from the top to the bottom of one side of the sculpture. The various pieces are stacked and leaned onto one another and welded together.^[1][2]

The sculpture's namesake, art historian and artist David Driskell, was widely cited during his life as one of the most influential scholars of African-American art history and was often credited with the establishment of the discipline as a distinct area of academic study. Driskell was a professor at the University of Maryland, College Park, for more than two decades and the university's David C. Driskell Center was named in his honor.^[3][4]

In 2021, the Driskell Center announced a new commission of a work of public art by artist Melvin Edwards.^[5] The sculpture was unveiled and installed in April 2024.^[1] The work was funded in part by the Mellon Foundation's Monuments Project.^[6]