Home Rule
Theresa Soares | Washington, D.C., United States
Photographer: Theresa Soares
Exhibit Title: Home Rule
Location: Washington, D.C., United States
On August 26, 2025, armed soldiers from the West Virginia and North Carolina National Guard were stationed around the Lincoln Memorial and Washington Monument in Washington, D.C. This series documents the tension between military presence and public space in the nation’s capital. Civilians moved through familiar landmarks now marked by rifles and fatigues, revealing subtle but telling juxtapositions: a woman climbing steps toward a line of armed soldiers, tourists pausing at the Reflecting Pool as uniforms passed by. Taken together, these photographs explore the blurred line between civic ritual and militarized surveillance, asking how democratic space is reshaped under the weight of state authority.
I came to the National Mall that morning not only as a photographer, but as a citizen. I was struck by the way familiar monuments, such as the Lincoln Memorial and the Washington Monument, had been transformed by the presence of soldiers. The juxtaposition of tourists and guardsmen, leisure and control, made visible the contradictions I often observe about American democracy: reverence for its ideals, unease about its realities. Photographing these moments was my way of documenting the public question: who is public space for, and what happens when it is guarded against the very people it was built to welcome?
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