Race: Power, Resistance & Change

Race: Power, Resistance & Change - Coming Fall 2025!

Race is both a powerful force and a constructed idea—it defines boundaries, identities, and opportunities, often reflecting systems of power and inequality.

Opening in Fall 2025, Race: Power, Resistance & Change engages with regionally focused stories of resistance and transformation that have shaped our understandings of race today. The exhibition presents a collection of moments from our complex history of race and racism to uncover underrepresented narratives through media, art, and archives.

The new experience explores how communities challenge mainstream narratives and share perspectives to resist systems of oppression.

Race: Power, Resistance, and Change is a call to action, offering a space to reflect on and engage with the social dynamics that shape current discussions on racial equality. As you explore these stories centered in the Californias, we invite you to examine your own experiences and connect with others in the shared effort to create a more equitable and inclusive future.

This experience is a reimagining of our current Race: Are We So Different? exhibition that has been on view at the Museum since 2011. The exhibition will partially close in Spring 2025 in preparation for the new experience.

Learn more about a few of the thought-provoking topics that will be in the new exhibition below.

What to Expect

Intersecting Identities

Art is a language of culture. It is a powerful reflection of the human experience—serving as personal expression, resistance, cultural preservation, and more.

Multimedia art works like murals, video animations, and interactive installations will illustrate the interconnectedness of race, ethnicity, gender, and class to identity today.

Resistance & Cultural Revitalization

The new exhibition will take visitors on a chronological journey – beginning in the era of Spanish colonization and ending in the contemporary moment. Visitors will learn about how Kumeyaay communities have resisted colonization and continue to practice cultural traditions.

Stan Rogriguez, Ph. D. (Kumeyaay-Iipay, Santa Ysabel) will create a traditional tule boat with Kumeyaay Community College students for the new exhibition.

The Civil Rights Era

Visitors will reflect on how the Civil Rights Movements of the 1960s and 1970s took hold in San Diego, from the American Indian Movement to the Black Panthers and Chicano Park.

Rendering of the future exhibit created by Optika Moderna

Support the Exhibit

The Museum of Us is dedicated to cultivating empathy and healing in our multinational San Diego-Tijuana-Kumeyaay border region through exhibits that blend art with storytelling.

We hope you will consider making a tax-deductible donation to help build the new exhibit, and support our efforts in amplifying the diverse stories that connect us all.

Subscribe to our email list to receive updates about the new exhibition right to your inbox.

Developing the New Experience

What do you want to see in an exhibit about race and identity?

Shaping the New “Race: Are We So Different?” Exhibit

Our exhibit, Race: Are We So Different?, first went on view at the Museum of Us in 2011 as a traveling exhibition developed by the American...

The “Race: Are We So Different?” Exhibit Project

Supporters

This exhibition is supported by the Prebys Foundation and the Institute of Museum and Library Services.