The City of Newark launched its social justice public art initiative by collaborating with the Rutgers University-Newark Graphic Design Program and several muralists and organizers to paint two of Newark’s busiest streets with prominent messages on Saturday, June 27, 2020. Over 200 community members arrived throughout the day to help complete the murals.
On Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Boulevard between the Essex County Historic Courthouse and Veterans’ Courthouse, the words “ABOLISH WHITE SUPREMACY” were painted in bright yellow traffic paint. On Halsey Street, east of the Rutgers campus, the words “ALL BLACK LIVES MATTER” takes up another City block.
“The convergence of art and protest is an age-old practice, especially pronounced in African-American culture,” Mayor Baraka said. “Poetry, music, graphic design, and public art are all public avenues to have our voices heard. Newark is a movement City as well as a City of artists.”
At the MLK site on Saturday, Mayor Baraka took up a roller and put down a few coats of the yellow paint, which is resistant to traffic wear.
The murals were designed using MARTIN by VocalType inspired by remnants of the Memphis Sanitation Strike of 1968, and the signs of striking workers declaring “I AM A MAN.” The letterforms live 25 ft’ in height, and were drafted by 80 local artists and design students/alumni in preparation for community painting. The Graphic Design program in the Department of Arts, Culture, and Media at Rutgers University-Newark is a social impact-driven design curriculum that embraces publicly-engaged and collaborative design practices. In collaboration with New Arts Justice, an incubator focused on intersectional approaches to art and activism, a series of large scale, typographic murals were envisioned that embody a powerful visual call-to-action.
“Our community street murals made a statement and model a solution,” said Professor Salamishah Tillet of Rutgers University-Newark and the director of New Arts Justice at Express Newark. “Through this unique collaboration between the city, community artists, and the university campus, we brought Newark, and our nation, one step closer to making the long-deferred dream of racial justice a reality.”
The murals are in solidarity with the “Black Lives Matter” protests with the encouragement of Mayor Ras J. Baraka, who drafted an ordinance approved by the City Council to create a permanent Office of Violence Prevention, which also declared white supremacist groups as terrorists and outlawed all their activity in the City. The City also removed a statue of Christopher Columbus from Washington Park, which the Mayor called “a statement against the barbarism, enslavement and oppression this particular explorer represents.”
“With these two statements, we are shifting the narrative and promoting thoughtful reflection and continued dialogue. In order to say Black Lives Matter, we have to Abolish White Supremacy,” said Arts and Cultural Affairs Director fayemishakur. “Through collective art-making, we were able to provide a space for safety, joy, and community engagement.”
Participants on Halsey Street waved the LGBTQ and Trans Pride Flag proudly in celebration of Global Pride Day. All Black Lives Matter is a statement of inclusivity which includes the Trans and Queer community, which has one of the highest murder rates in the nation.
Other partners in the project include the New Arts Justice program at Express Newark, the Newark Downtown District (NDD), Newark Arts, Project for Empty Space, and the Sherwin Williams Paint Company.
