Race and Art

Disclaimer: Before presenting my artists I will address why these artists are important in their field of activism and worth taking note of rather than incoherent babblings of a half-baked idea. In my descriptions of these projects I specifically point out those parts which I find useful and leave out parts that I believe have been diluted away from their original intention. The lack of coverage of these aspects comes from me personally not believing it to be useful not lack of research.

Racism, especially in policing is an issue that occurs due to a reason such as increased crime rates by certain race or ethnicity for the vast majority of occurrences. Racism is a problem even in America the most equal of diverse nations. My theory behind the lagging back and continuing of racism is that it stems from the wage gap. However we have come forward in strides the past century to make our fellow Americans equal in this field. In fact certain racial groups such as Asian Americans and Indian Americans are reporting higher earnings than Whites. The question is why have Indian Americans and Asian Americans progressed so far from the days of racial inequality that they faced when they were performing the most dangerous job of planting and detonating explosives for half the pay of the Hispanic workers. How and why were these racial groups progressing so far while Hispanic and Black people in the work force remained behind? In order to eliminate racism we should focus on what causes the increased rate of criminal activities in Hispanic and Black communities especially since the victims of these crimes tends to be someone of the perpetrator’s own race and therefore doubly sets that race back. This is the wage gap as someone who has money is less likely to commit a crime, especially violent ones than someone who doesn’t.

As previously stated the reason behind the racism in policing, the disparity between racial groups in regards to crime both stem from wage earnings in my opinion. In my researched opinion the reason behind the wage gap is the understanding and sympathy that the majority of people feel towards the race. I believe that in order to close the wage gap which is the source of these race problems we need to promote inter-racial understanding and break down those things that separate us. We should become the melting pot that America is thought to be in actuality. While allowing people to keep their racial identity and remaining respectful of it we must come to understand and accept it in all its detail. The three artists I have chosen are three that I feel do this in varying capacities.

William Pope L – Black Factory

The Black Factory is a van owned by William Pope L that goes to various art exhibits and displays a blow-up igloo of what he describes as Black-ness. This is meant to show people of other races what being black is like and therefore promote understanding between the races and work to bring us all together. William Pope L uses the igloo as his medium to communicate with his audience and engages the audience by popping up in a place that surprises them.

Ruben Ortiz Torres – Hats

Ruben Ortiz Torres is an innovative artists who employs a huge variety of means to deliver his message. Hats is my favorite example and it addresses not only his problems as a Mexican American by giving social commentary and promoting understanding of his and other races through racially charge hats but also addresses issues faced by Native Americans and other racial groups. Hats is my personal favorite project on race issues due to its creativity and the artistic eye grabbing form that it takes often with a clear message.

The public – Black Lives Matter

This project is one that I am both critical of and support. Due to its mixed motivations. While I condemn statement such as “What do we want? Dead cops! When do we want them? Now!” and other such promotions of violence it is important to address issues such as disparaging amounts of young black men being killed by cops. I believe however that the way to accomplish this is by taking a less direct path by promoting race relations rather than protesting. While protesting when done peacefully is good for gathering public support it also is an escalation of an issue rather than an effort to come to an understanding. If the Black Lives Matter protest called for a specific course of action such as retraining cops or decreasing the rate at which cops respond with lethal force then I could more fully support it however at the moment the movement is too disorganized and supports violence to regularly for me to believe in it’s cause.