Meet the caretakers archiving Renee Macklin Good's memorial, Ryan Vizzions and James Forbes

 Via MPR News

March 24, 2026

Ryan Vizzions has been photographing items left behind at the memorial for Renee Macklin Good, who was fatally shot by a federal agent in January in Minneapolis. Ben Hovland | MPR News

Nearly three months after Renee Macklin Good was fatally shot by a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent in Minneapolis, a dedicated group of volunteers still watches over the site daily. They’re thinking now about the future of the memorial there as they archive what mourners have left behind.

“It's really important for me … to make sure that we preserve these items for future generations,” said Ryan Vizzions, a volunteer who’s been living for months in his van with his dog, Freedom.

Vizzions is collecting and documenting signs, stuffed animals, hats and candles from the memorial in a garage a few minutes' drive away — a space provided by someone he met through social media.

It's a cozy space. There are large boxes of signs, each neatly labeled by size. Some of them had been outside for months and needed to be dried out before Vizzions could photograph them.

He has a box of small items he hasn’t gotten to yet: handmade bracelets, small trinkets. Archiving requires attention to detail.

It isn't clear what will happen to the materials once they're photographed and archived.

For the pair, the fire reiterated the need to protect and preserve the memorial. Visitors continue to show up daily with letters, flowers, candles and signs.

Caretakers have created a path at the vigil site with mulch and stone pavers. They hope to plant flowers now that it's warm outside.

Vizzions said it’s a balance between trying to honor Macklin Good while also honoring the community that lives immediately around the memorial.

For the pair, the fire reiterated the need to protect and preserve the memorial. Visitors continue to show up daily with letters, flowers, candles and signs.

Caretakers have created a path at the vigil site with mulch and stone pavers. They hope to plant flowers now that it's warm outside.

Vizzions said it’s a balance between trying to honor Macklin Good while also honoring the community that lives immediately around the memorial.

Full article here

Monroe Gallery will exhibit a selection of Ryan Vizzions' photographs from Minneapolis at The Photography Show presented by AIPAD, April 22-26 in booth B10.

Ryan Vizzions: The Tender Work of Preserving Renee Good’s Memorial

 Via Hyperallergic

March 16, 2026

Ryan Vizzions is archiving the objects left at the site of Renee Good’s murder. (all photos by and courtesy Ryan Vizzions)

Ryan Vizzions, a photojournalist from Atlanta, had already arrived in Minnesota when federal immigration agents murdered poet and mother Renee Nicole Macklin Good.

For the last five years, the traveling photographer has been living out of his small van as he travels across the country for a photo survey exploring what it means to be American in all 50 states. He was taking photos at Lake Superior when he learned of Good’s killing, and drove immediately to the street where agents shot Good in her car. He arrived in time for a massive vigil held in Good’s memory.

Nearly two months after Good’s murder, Vizzions is still in Minnesota, but his focus has shifted from observation to intervention. He is now the de facto archivist of Good’s memorial site, where mourners have left hundreds of devotional objects, short notes, and artwork in protest and in grief.

Vizzions among Good memorial objects at his undisclosed storage site

“I want to make sure people in the future understand what happened here,” Vizzions told Hyperallergic in an interview.

So far, Vizzions has photographed about 200 items and relocated fragile objects to what he described as a “secret location” in the southern part of the city.

He’s left behind some items, including plastic signs, for the public to view. Alongside community members, Vizzions is maintaining the site, including by removing what he described as hundreds of pounds of decaying flowers.

Among the items Vizzions has documented is a note signed by an employee of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), the agency driving the Trump administration’s escalating immigration enforcement tactics. 

“Ms. Good,” the message reads, “We will never forget you. Rest in peace and power. Your work on earth is done. Your legacy lives on.” 

The card, which is covered in stickers, is signed, “A DHS employee.”

“That was probably the most surprising because that’s somebody who is involved with the same institution that ultimately killed her,” Vizzions told Hyperallergic. 

Mourners attended a vigil for Good hours after federal agents killed her.

Vizzions made the leap from outside observer to active participant in Minneapolis’s response to Good’s murder after someone attempted to burn the memorial site and extreme winter conditions set in, threatening to destroy the makeshift monument.

On February 18, someone poured gasoline on the memorial and lit a flame. Vizzions said that he and a group of community members watching over the site at night were able to stop the fire from spreading.

While Vizzions has previously photographed political apexes, including Dakota Access Pipeline protests at Standing Rock, he said he had never before inserted himself in the communities he covers.

“ As a photojournalist, oftentimes you’re divided from the community because you’re on the outside looking in,” Vizzions said. “And I wanted to serve.” 

Vizzions told Hyperallergic that Good’s parents are aware of his project and that he is in communication with a family friend who is serving as a mediator. Ultimately, Vizzions said, he will respect the family’s wishes for any next steps for the collection. He expects that some of the items could end up in the collections of private institutions or in the archives of the Smithsonian, but noted that whatever happens next will not be his decision to make. 

In the meantime, he is photographing and digitizing items from Good’s vigil so that anyone can experience them, regardless of where they live.

“It’s  really important for me to make sure that the folks who couldn’t be here, and the family who couldn’t come to the vigil because of everything happening, are able to access the memorial in person or online,” Vizzions said.

The photographer recalled one snow-covered note that made him cry. It read: “ We all carry whistles now. I hope you hear them. I hope you’re home. We all carry each other now. I know you’re with us. I know you’re home.”

The message is a nod to activists’ use of whistles to alert community members of potential immigration raids.

“It was just on a small note that was tucked somewhere,” Vizzons said. “But that’s just one of hundreds, if not thousands, of items that people have left. It’s that message and the other message that really make it feel like we have an obligation to protect these offerings that people brought to her.”

Full article here

See Ryan Vizzions' photographs from Minneapolis at The Photography Show Presented by AIPAD April 22-26, Monroe Gallery Booth B10.

 

Ryan Vizzions on archiving the Renee Good memorial

 

Via The Minneapolis Star Tribune

Video: Richard Tsong-Taatarii/The Minnesota Star Tribune

March 6, 2026

When it comes to archiving spontaneous public memorials, there are no clear pathways for what to do. Ryan Vizzions, a traveling photographer, started collecting posters from the spontaneous public memorial that sprung up at the site of Renee Good’s killing. What happens next depends on the family’s wishes. Tap the link to read the full report by Alicia Eler.

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Ryan Vizzions archives Renee Good memorial site artifacts

 Via The Minnesota Star Tribune

By Alicia Eler

March 3, 2026

Ryan Vizzions:  

January 7th, 2026 - After the murder of Renee Good by a masked federal agent, a vigil was held in her honor. Upward of 10,000 Minnesotans showed up to pay their respects at the location she was killed

What happens next depends on the family’s wishes.

Ryan Vizzions started collecting posters from the spontaneous public memorial that sprung up at the site of Renee Good’s killing. The traveling photographer appointed himself the site’s caretaker.

He also gathered many other items — a cookie jar filled with handwritten letters rolled into scrolls, letters addressed to Good’s family, a canvas covered with names of people killed by federal agents since 2025.

“All these are prayers,” Vizzions said. “These are things that people brought because they cared. We owe it to them to try and preserve them and save them and make it so the future can learn about what happened here.”

When it comes to archiving spontaneous public memorials, there are no clear pathways for what to do. The work is fluid, and caretakers volunteer because they feel called to do so. It’s all open-ended and grassroots; people write the rules as they go along. Even the city of Minneapolis doesn’t have timelines for what happens to memorials, city spokeswoman Jess Olstad said.

At Good’s site, it’s unknown where the gathered items will ultimately go, but community members are in contact with the Good family about next steps.

Vizzions initially rented a storage unit for the posters and other items, but moved them to a more secure undisclosed residential location in south Minneapolis.

“These sites emerge when the future feels uncertain and the past feels unfinished,” said Alex Pretti memorial site caretaker Jadah Green, 43, at a “Caring for Spontaneous Public Memorials After State Violence” panel discussion Feb. 27. “They are not permanent installations. They are not yet historical memory. They are living thresholds.”

Vulnerable memorials

Vizzions has been guarding, cleaning and organizing the site since the week after Good was killed. The site is vulnerable to changing weather and vandalism ― like when someone poured gasoline on it and lit a nearby pile of wood on fire Feb. 17.

The city doesn’t take care of the sites, but might help with cleanup or security. Caretakers do the daily work of talking to visitors, cleaning the site and keeping it beautiful.

Paul Eaves of Minneapolis helps out at George Floyd Square and the Pretti and Good memorial sites.

“It’s not about ego,” said Eaves, 77. “It’s about service.”

Minneapolis City Council Member Jason Chavez said he would like to see a permanent memorial for Good, but stressed that it’s up to the family, and it isn’t a decision that the city will or should make.

“I’ve heard from so many Latino neighbors, immigrant neighbors, about the courage that Renee Good had to look out for our community in a time when many of us feel like we have been sent back into the shadows,” said Chavez, who called the memorial a sacred space. “She brought light into this world.”

He wants caretakers and people affected by ICE to have a place “to mourn and celebrate Renee’s life, and a place where we can never forget what the federal government did and continues to do to our community.”

Vizzions’ favorite piece from the memorial is a painting on cardboard of Good in blue with the American flag.

“When we were doing the watch and we’d sit out there next to the fire, this one was facing us,” he said of painting. “For three weeks I stared at this piece.”

Vizzions raised more than $2,000 to pay for the storage space and equipment, including lights, backdrop, camera stands, tables, storage boxes and more.

In 2017, he published the photo book “No Spiritual Surrender: A Dedication to the Standing Rock Movement.”

He was in northern Minnesota on another project when he heard about Good’s killing. He drove down to Minneapolis and began camping out in front of the memorial in his van.

Through the process, he feels he’s become part of the community, and he’s contributing to the greater good.

The family’s decision

Rise & Remember Executive Director Jeanelle Austin said community members waited nearly two months to reach out to George Floyd’s family after his killing in 2020.

“You have to be able to give the families the time that they need to do all of the other things that take priority, and then when the family is ready, for them to decide what they want to do,” Austin said. “As caretakers, we’re keepers of the stories ― our job is not to make final decisions or final calls of what’s to come next.” --Full article with photographs

Ryan Vizzions Photographed Renee Good Memorial Site Arson

 Via Minnesota Star Tribune

February 18, 2026

Someone doused Renee Good’s south Minneapolis memorial and a nearby pile of wood with gasoline and started a fire at about 9 p.m. Tuesday, Feb. 17.

A fence was charred, and several items in the memorial were damaged, but the memorial site at 34th Street and Portland Avenue wasn’t burned down. No one was injured, Minneapolis police said.

Photojournalist Ryan Vizzions, 43, smelled gasoline from inside his van, which was parked near the memorial site.

“I looked out my windshield and I see orange,” he said. “My eyes lit up.”

Vizzions jumped out of the van after seeing the flames. Neighbors who live in the apartment building in front of Good’s memorial used two fire extinguishers to put out the blaze, he said.

Community members had covered the memorial site with a tarp earlier to protect it from the rain.

“We’ve been hypervigilant in our neighborhood and obviously everyone’s keeping an eye out all of the time,” said Wren Clinefelter, 23, who lives near the memorial. “So it’s definitely very disheartening to hear that someone would try and burn down a memorial for a woman who was killed in our neighborhood.”

Vizzions posted a video of the scene to his Instagram account.

More with video reporting via WCCO on Facebook