I make political posters. My hand silkscreen printed art pieces reflect social and environmental issues throughout my community and nationwide. Being an Oakland native I find inspiration in the varying radical poster makers in the bay area, from the Black Panther movement, to my neighboring Chicano communities and now freedom fighting citizens in the Occupy rebellion. I exercise my activism through the creation of these posters to be geared towards wheat pasting them on the streets. I aim to identify with an issue, educate myself on its matter, and convincingly proclaim my exploration to inform the masses. I hope to influence individuals to want to look further into these correlating issues and feel inspired to take charge in their own responsive activism.
My past collaborative posters have included large-scale images of costly prison towers vs. depleted spending on education, a poster I call, “Education Not Incarceration.” It is a poster I donated to the William James Association to help raise funds for their diminishing arts program. I also created a poster against the Monsanto Corporation advocating local organic farming. This poster later became a print I simplified to fit on shopping bags adding a second print on the reverse side with key GMO facts and grocery products that are safe to consume. My latest protest poster raises concerns about Hydraulic Fracturing, an unsafe routine enforced to extract “natural” gas from the earth below.
I anticipate developing more posters about environmental and social justice issues and aspire to find my own personal style while maintaining my responsibility as an artist of the people to expose the truths behind our corrupt system.