The event will feature brief remarks from UAlbany President Havidán Rodríguez, remembrances from those who worked with her, and dramatic readings of original poems about Morrison by Dr. Leonard A. Slade Jr., professor of Africana Studies at UAlbany, and performer, visual artist and poet D. Colin, a UAlbany alumna.

We also will unveil a new exhibit of papers, photographs and archival items, as well as Morrison’s office chair from her time here at UAlbany.

Last month, hundreds gathered at Page Hall on the downtown UAlbany campus as the NYS Writers Institute hosted “A Tribute to Toni Morrison” which included a screening of the 2019 documentary "The Pieces I Am" and a panel discussion about her life and legacy.

"Toni Morrison spent five years as a faculty member at the University at Albany in the 1980s, where she forged a special connection to the NYS Writers Institute," said Paul Grondahl, director of the NYS Writers Institute.

The Nobel Prize-winning author died at age 88 on August 5, 2019, in New York City. In the 1980s, she shared office space and collaborated frequently with Writers Institute founder William Kennedy. Morrison addressed a packed audience at UAlbany in 1984, just the second featured writer in the Institute's history. She also wrote parts of Beloved, one of the most acclaimed novels in all of American literature, while at UAlbany, and the news of her Pulitzer Prize in 1988 came with a phone call to the Institute's office.