In late Spring 2023, West Port were commissioned by the Fitzwilliam Museum of the University of Cambridge to design two concurrent exhibitions opening in the Autumn of that year.

The first of those exhibitions to open was Black Atlantic: Power, People, Resistance, an exhibition that explores some new stories from history and the university and the museums links with the Atlantic slave trade. By bringing together collections (historic and contemporary) from across the University of Cambridge’s museums, libraries and colleges with loans from around the world, the exhibition asks new questions about Cambridge’s role in the transatlantic slave trade and looks at how objects and artworks have influenced history and perspectives. This exhibition was unique as it was the first time in the two century history of the museum that their main Founders Galleries (Grade 1 listed) were to be used for a temporary exhibition space.

Black Atlantic’s main architectural statement was to be a takeover of the space with bold, geometric forms and shapes weaving its way through the Founders Galleries. The existing galleries, a prominent symbol of perceived Eurocentric grandness, were our canvas and instead of working directly against the spaces, we wanted to create a flow and sense of waves crashing through the spaces, room-to-room and with the telling of the unknown stories.