My name is Daryl Elaine Wells, and I’m the founder and director of Art Responders, a nonprofit organization that focuses on artists’ responses to police brutality and racial injustice in law enforcement.  For over three years I’ve focused my time and energy on this issue, creating yearly calendars featuring portraits and stories of police victims, with the proceeds going to organizations that fight for racial justice.  My brother, Paul, who suffered from schizophrenia, was harassed by police from the time he was a teenager– so even though he appears not to have died at the hands of police, I established my organization and continue to work against police brutality in his honor.

Just over a year ago I began curating an art show, VIRAL: 25 Years from Rodney King, bringing together art, music and writing about police violence by artists from all over the country.  I was inspired by the Names Project AIDS memorial quilt, which began touring the country in the eighties and has continued to grow, providing a striking visual reminder of the scale of that epidemic.  So far VIRAL has traveled to Los Angeles and Oakland, and I have interest from venues in New Orleans and Baltimore to bring the show to those cities as well.

I had seen some of Ravi Zupa’s work around police brutality themes, which I thought were beautiful and emotionally profound, so in winter of 2016, I wrote to him asking if he would contribute work to the show.  Ravi is a very prolific and successful artist, and I didn’t expect to hear back from him– but not only did he send me two original prints for the exhibition, he also agreed to let me use the images for whatever purposes.  This was very helpful to me as a small, black woman owned-and-operated business; the exhibitions were completely self-funded through crowdfunding from my friends, family and extended networks, and I used posters and shirts containing Ravi’s images to raise money to fund continuing the show to Oakland last fall.

Ravi sent additional work for that show, as well.  His work is always popular with young people, with its references to hip hop culture, and youth engagement is a large part of our mission with the VIRAL: RK25 exhibition show.  We featured education programs that were all free and open to the public, including a youth summit featuring Oscar Grant’s uncle, who led a ‘know your rights’ workshop informing young people of color how to stay safe during interactions with law enforcement.

As a black woman in my forties, I have lived through several waves of public outrage over the most egregious cases (Rodney King, Amadou Diallo, Oscar Grant, Mike Brown), but they have always been followed by long periods of inaction when some other big news story came along to take its place. Part of my mission with Art Responders is to keep this issue in the public consciousness and remind people that it’s not going away or getting better without our continued outrage, action, and advocacy. Having artists on board creating images that reinforce our message is crucial; having artists who are willing to use the proceeds to fund organizations that provide direct action towards effecting change is event more necessary.

When I met Ravi in September, he told me about the idea for an emergency fund he was considering creating in response to the ongoing epidemic of police killings and we spent some time developing the idea.  It had the advantage of reinforcing the inevitability of this crisi, the unavoidable reality that at any given time, another unarmed black person will be killed by police– most likely a young male– because our system has permitted and even facilitated this form of modern-day lynching for so long.

When I spoke to Ravi about this, we agreed that we would have to direct all the funds to local organizations that work towards helping the families of victims and preventing future tragedies, and that transparency would be key; very careful records would have to be kept and made available to all parties involved. Ravi asked me if I would consider helping him in this search, since I have been connecting to families touched by law enforcement violence for several years, and researching the causes that allow this phenomenon to continue unabated, and which organizations address the varied aspects of this fight.  Although I had never had any previous contact with Dallas’ Mothers Against Police Brutality, I was aware of their groundbreaking work, and agreed with Ravi that MAPB would be a suitable recipient of proceeds from the release of his first emergency fund print.

Obviously, it is important that no one benefits financially from the these murders.  Through my work with Art Responders, I have met several family members of other police victims, who have conveyed to me the disbelief, heartbreak, and incredible anger that comes from these pointless killings, and their resistance to any exploitation of their loved ones’ memory. It is vitally important to me and to Ravi that profits from the memory of these victims are harnessed to bring positive change.  My desire is to keep this crisis at the forefront of public consciousness through of all kinds– music, visual art, writing– because the arts have a way of bringing new depth, meaning, and clarity to viewers who are increasingly numb to the innumerable recorded killings available in our viral video world.

As the mother of a 5 year old, I have the same fears that any black parent has regarding the safety of my son in a world where black lives are treated as disposable.  I wouldn’t be able to live with myself if I didn’t feel I was doing everything in my power to make change. Being an artist, art educator, and community arts organizer, I have attempted to bring my skills to the fight in whatever way I possibly can.  My organization’s partnership with Ravi has been a part of this battle, allowing artists the opportunity to contribute to ending unaccountable state-sanctioned killings of black and brown people.

My hope is that Ravi’s work will expose the issue to people who might not normally engage with this issue, and that such increased attention can be leveraged into desperately needed funding to assist in this urgent fight.  I also hope Ravi’s work will speak to a new generation of artists who will see that it is possible to contribute to the change through thoughtful, effective and powerful work on topics of social justice that affect them most.

If you have any questions or concerns about this project, or would like to know more about the work Art Responders does, please feel free to contact me at <artresponders@gmail.com>.

With sincerest condolences to all the families and communities hurt by this tragedy, and in solidarity–

Daryl

D.E. Stenvoll-Wells

Founder and Director, Art Responders

artresponders.org