Free Speech Zone was first installed in 2004 in the second-floor mezzanine of the Brooklyn Public Library Main Branch at Grand Army Plaza.

The installation incorporated two sets of electronic, illuminated triptychs consisting of two backlit portraits of blindfolded library users that flanked an LED display sign scrolling a collage of titles and passages from censored and challenged books.

One year later, we installed Free Speech Zone in the front entrance of the Donnell Library Center during Banned Book Month. Passersby stopped to read statements and titles from challenged and banned books.

The library hosted a reading of challenged books in collaboration with PEN American Center and the National Coalition Against Censorship. Judy Blume, Deborah Hautzig, Robert Lipsyte, Walter Dean Myers, Phyllis Reynolds Naylor, Peter Sis, Rita Williams-Garcia read from their challenged and censored books.

This was the first live event streamed over the internet by a branch library of the NYPL. You can see it here: Free Speech Zone reading.