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Hub City: An Interdisciplinary Exploration of History, Art, and Identity
January 26, 2026 - March 27, 2026
Human Rights Institute Gallery (Nancy Thompson Learning Commons)
About the Exhibition
Hub City is a multidisciplinary project that brings together visual art, theater, and music to examine America’s racial traumas through the lenses of family legacy, spirituality, and historical reckoning. Centered on the often-overlooked history of slavery and freedom in New Brunswick, the exhibition reimagines the city as a historic “hub” of both bondage and liberation.
Through layered paintings, symbolic textures, and narrative-driven imagery, the work explores themes of ancestry, autonomy, and resilience. Hub City confronts difficult historical truths while also celebrating Black family joy, survival, and continuity. By weaving personal memory with collective history, the exhibition invites viewers to reflect on the enduring impact of the past and the power of art as a space for healing, dialogue, and remembrance.
Selected Works
About the Artist
Jaymes Jorsling is a multidisciplinary artist, playwright, and actor whose work draws from personal experience, cultural history, and spiritual inquiry. Born deaf in one ear and raised as an African American child of immigrants, his artistic practice reflects a lifelong pursuit of understanding identity, struggle, and triumph.
His play (A)loft Modulation ran off-Broadway and received multiple award nominations, and he wrote the script for Grammy-nominated jazz artist Gerald Clayton’s Piedmont Blues: Search for Salvation, which is currently touring internationally. Jorsling’s work spans stage, film, television, and voice-over, with appearances in productions such as The Wire, Law & Order, and The Affair, as well as national campaigns for major brands.
Based in Brooklyn, Jorsling is a Magna Cum Laude graduate of the City University of New York and has received fellowships, grants, and commissions from institutions including Duke University, Brown University, the Eugene O’Neill National Playwrights Conference, the Brooklyn Museum, and BRIC Studios. His work continues to bridge disciplines, using storytelling as a means to explore history, identity, and collective healing. Website: https://www.jaymesjorsling.com/
Instagram: @jaymesjorsling
About the Gallery
The Human Rights Institute, including the Human Rights Institute Gallery, was founded in 2008 and is housed in the Nancy Thompson Learning Commons (library). This facility features two seminar-style classrooms, a central office, and a state-of-the-art exhibit space that is used to highlight issues, artwork, and films related to human rights violations and victories. Our mission is to highlight human rights issues around the world, while inspiring the next generation of leaders to create a more just and peaceful society. We host special events including lectures, book discussions and film screenings, art showcases, major symposia, and human rights weeks.
The HRI’s work aligns with the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR), a document adopted by the United Nations in 1948 with the goal of creating universal standards for human rights that apply to all persons around the world no matter their nation of origin. Within the document are 30 articles proscribed with detailed explanations of each human right and its implication on societies. Article 27 reads “Everyone has the right freely to participate in the cultural life of the community, to enjoy the arts and to share in scientific advancement and its benefits. Everyone has the right to the protection of the moral and material interests resulting from any scientific, literary or artistic production of which he is the author” (UDHR). Article 27 is a fundamental influence on the HRI’s gallery and the chosen exhibitions each semester.