VOICES FOR CHANGE

After witnessing the death of George Floyd, another Black man who was murdered at the hands of police, many went to the streets to protest. This momentum quickly grew into a global cry that Black Lives Matter. This sentiment has extended to many fields and people have started to strongly question corporations, institutions, and organizations on the continuation of institutional racism. While many have finally addressed their solidarity to racial equality, we have also watched as various organizations stumbled, dropped the ball, or stayed silent. 

As The Color Network, an organization of artists of color, our mission is to aid in the advancement of people of color in the ceramic arts through development, networking, and mentorship. While maintaining our current resources, including an artist database, we decided to produce a video to address what change looks from the perspective of a BIPOC voice. We wanted to help give actionable steps to institutions that are listening so they can have an idea of where to start. 

Our video is comprised of eight voices: Natalia Arbelaez (Interdisciplinary artist, researcher, and educator), Paul Briggs (Associate Professor of Art Education at MassArt), Adam Chau (Artist and Museum Manager at Hudson Valley MOCA), Jennifer Ling Datchuk (Assistant Professor of Ceramics at Texas State University), April D. Felipe (Artist and community arts educator), Salvador Jiménez-Flores (Artist and Assistant Professor at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago), Robert Lugo (Artist, social activist, poet and Professor at Temple University), and Yinka Orafidiya (Potter and socially engaged artist). 

University of Arkansas: Voices for Change

The work presented speaks of racial identity in both overt and subversive ways; this coding of culture plays to many levels, including a window for the group it represents as well as to those who have no experience in marginalization. The effort into creating work that speaks to difficult issues is a hard task for an artist as they must balance aesthetics, formal theory, historic precedent, and an independent voice. This is only to say that intersectionality is needed in order to see the whole picture - no one artist has the answer to solving a broken system of inclusion and equity. These exhibiting artists have various backgrounds, ages, and ethnicities; all artists of color, active voices in our community, and want to share insights on change. While our plights are different and have faced our own obstacles while navigating the art field, we believe that when we speak up for each other our voices are stronger.