Female Muralists Transform the District /  by Lanie Edwards

Colorful mural walls have flooded all of our Instagram feeds at some point. See one that goes well with your outfit? Picture. Spot one with your favorite musician, athlete, or actor? Click. If you don’t have at least one highly saturated image posing in front of one, are you even a millennial? While these intricate designs painted on public walls serve as great photo ops, they also have a far more important purpose. They can empower a community, bring in more business, and make a statement.

In Washington, D.C., two badass female muralists are taking over the district one wall at a time. Been to the Fridge Gallery in Southeast and noticed the colorful mural of four women on a black wall? That’s Rose Jaffe. Snapped a great pic in front of the Chuck Brown mural in Anacostia? You can thank Maria Miller for that. While Jaffe and Miller have different styles and techniques, both are prominent women in the street art scene who are not only transforming boring walls around the nation’s capital but giving a voice to communities and causes that otherwise may not be heard. 

“I love if my work has a message,” says Jaffe, born and raised in D.C. “I do a lot of social justice and activism work, and I think that it’s really beautiful if a mural can reflect the community that it’s in, and uplift the voices that are there in that community.” 

Jaffe does it all: painting, sculpting, graphic design, and illustrations. She’s a full-time artist who favors portraying the female form in various ways (i.e. The breast mugs, obsessed). She is fascinated by people, faces, and the stories that they tell, which is evident when looking at her murals. With the flick of a paintbrush, Jaffe can make any wall come to life. 

“Street art” is considered to be a male-dominated scene, and the few women who are involved can often feel tokenized. However, Jaffe doesn’t define herself as a “street artist.” She refers to herself as a “mural artist,” and does not consider murals to be graffiti. Instead, she believes they are more like public art pieces.

As a female mural artist, Jaffe feels she has gotten tremendous support from everyone – male and female artists, as well as from D.C. as a whole. She is the recipient of numerous grants and is able to fully support herself through her work.

You can view the completed mural Rose was working on in the video at the Femme Fatale Pop Up Store along the H St Corridor at 1371 H St. NE until the end of July 2017.  

Maria Miller, a muralist in D.C. and Virginia, has felt that same support in the district. 

Originally a canvas painter, Miller’s first mural project was in Richmond, VA in 2013, which led to her growing interest in public and street art. Unlike Jaffe and her paintbrush, Miller uses spray paint. 

“It’s become something not so much just about myself, but I love the feeling of painting in a community and them telling me how much they love it,” says Miller. “It’s such a gratifying feeling.”

Miller’s current project is a portrait of Chuck Brown for the Legends of Go Go Mural in Southeast D.C. It is a publicly funded mural that users will be able to interact with by scanning the pieces with their smartphones. When completed, it will be the first mural in the district to honor the legacy of musicians such as Brown, Little Benny, Fat Rodney, Byron “BJ” Jackson, and more. 

“Go Go is such an important part of the community so people are receiving it well,” says Miller.

As far as being a female mural artist in D.C., Miller has had a similar experience to Jaffe. She feels very supported and encouraged. 

 “I think for the most part a lot of people are very open and receptive to seeing more female artists around… especially other females,” says Miller. “I think catcalling is the most uncomfortable thing, but other than that I just take it as I go. I’m seeing more and more female artists and everyone wanting to see more of them.”

Check out the video to learn more about these fantastic artists and see some of their work. 

To donate to the Go Go Mural, visit: Gofundme.com/go-go-mural-fund 

Hebru Brantley's Flyboy Mural in Pittsburgh /  by Alex Young

Hebru Brantley painting his Flyboy mural - photograph by Alex Young

Hebru Brantley painting his Flyboy mural - photograph by Alex Young

"World class" art displays minutes outside of Pittsburgh at the corner of Wallace Avenue and Pitt Street in Wilkinsburg, Pa.

Renowned visual artist Hebru Brantley of Chicago initially came to Pittsburgh for his "I Wish I Knew (How It Felt To Be Free)" exhibit last May. Inside the city's August Wilson Center for African American Culture, he exhibited his Flyboy sculptures and paintings, which reflect the disenfranchised youth's adventure and imagination. According to Marqui Lyons, the program manager at the Pittsburgh Cultural Trust who brought Brantley to the city, "I Wish I Knew (How It Felt To Be Free)" attracted 10,000 people to the exhibit from May to July.

Now, people can travel to Wilkinsburg to see Brantley's new Flyboy mural that serves as a mark of talent and community enrichment.

The effort of the Cultural Trust and the Wilkinsburg Arts Commission to bring a permanent Brantley piece to the city "celebrates work by African Americans and improves the neighborhood," developer Michael Polite said during the mural's unveiling on Friday morning.

Add Brantley's new mural in Pittsburgh to his list of public and private works that he's been recognized for, like another mural in Detroit, an ad for Cadillac, or his exhibit in Switzerland.

At the unveiling ceremony, Brantley spoke from his cherry picker crane while putting the finishing touches on his art. He told a story about how the day before a young black boy walked down Wallace Ave., and slowed to stare at the painting of a black boy flying through the air like a superhero. Brantley saw the boy "connect" with Flyboy, a symbol of encouragement. "The mural in Wilkinsburg depicts a black kid traveling safely through the city," he said.

Brantley's work promotes inspiration because Flyboy supports young kids' identity and "what it means to fly in your imagination." Overall, Brantley said he is blessed to shift the narrative in Pittsburgh and "uplift people."

Duces Pittsburgh. It's been real.

A post shared by Hebru Brantley (@hebrubrantley) on

Hebru Brantley's Flyboy

501 Wallace Avenue

Pittsburgh, PA 15221

DeRay Mckesson: Organizing at Scale /  by Maxwell Young

Photograph by Michael Ferrier

Photograph by Michael Ferrier

The social media generation is barely thirteen years old, and it has already revolutionized the way people share information.  In 2004, Facebook catalyzed what we know now as a social network.  Our interests, thoughts, and memories were encapsulated in an online community where people from around the world could interact with one another through group pages, status updates and photo archives that have come to represent a digital identity of our lives. The first YouTube video recorded in 2005—“Me at the zoo”—has engendered millions of visual journalists telling stories on the platform through a unique lens.  And in 140 characters or less, we can inform the whole world that Beyoncé is expecting twins with one tweet.

For a long time though, information was asymmetrical.  Information was controlled and disseminated by institutions like media syndicates and the federal government, manipulating the way it was perceived.  Malcolm X was conveyed through nightly news channels as a militant Muslim, while mass incarceration, which pervaded through the 1980s, was disguised as the “War on drugs” and justified by the support of our youth with “Just Say No” campaigns.  It wasn’t the idea of abstaining from recreational drug use that was the problem.  The problem, which unfortunately is embedded within the prejudice of the criminal justice system, arose when peoples of color were voiceless—plugged into newsreels that projected fear into the American conscious, widening the margin of white supremacy.

In 2017, video footage of New York police officers strangling and suffocating Eric Garner, a black male, who desperately cries out, “I can’t breathe,” is a viral reminder of police brutality thanks to YouTube and Twitter sharing.  In 2017, students from across the country can stand in solidarity with the Black Lives Matter movement by posting statuses on Facebook.  In 2017, the violent persecution of black people and other historically oppressed peoples can no longer be misconstrued to fit some xenophobic agenda.  The media is everyone and information is everywhere.

Mckesson and a student take a selfie. Photograph by Michael Ferrier

Mckesson and a student take a selfie. Photograph by Michael Ferrier

DeRay Mckesson has become the figurehead of activism in the digital age.  The blue Patagonia vest he wears every day has quickly become his identifier, like the late Steve Jobs’ black turtleneck, dad jeans, and New Balance sneakers ensemble he wore during Apple product launches.

“I have the single biggest platform of [activist] individuals.  I had about 800,000 followers on Twitter when I started in the protests…and I became known as the guy in the blue vest to people.  It’s a safety blanket,” he says of the jacket.  “I’ve never not had it overnight.”

“I think about social media activism as our way to push back. As people of color, we’ve always faced this issue of an erasure.  An erasure manifests in one of two ways: one, is that the story is never told and two, that the story is told by everyone but us.  In this moment, we became the un-erased.  We became our own storytellers, and we were able to push our own ideas.”

Mckesson is leading a new wave of activism in the United States.  From protests in Ferguson, Mo. and Baltimore, Md. following the deaths of Mike Brown and Freddie Gray to fiery debates with Fox News’ Sean Hannity, the Baltimore native has been a fixture in the conversations of police brutality and Black Lives Matter.  These conversations are more about how to enact change as opposed to deriding societal institutions and issues.

He says, “When I hear people talk about the work of dismantling oppressive systems, I feel like people get the ‘dismantle’ part really well.  But the build part is two pronged: one, we have to think about what these institutions would look like and two, we have to have a set of people ready to lead them.  It’s not enough to have people ready to tear them down…How do we create the next set of people who can build?  That has to be a part of the work.”

Mckesson has been tinkering, on a national scale, with the way in which these new ideas and institutions can be organized.  In 2015, the 31-year old launched “Mapping Police Violence,” which is a website that collects data on people killed by police.  Moreover, to enforce the messages of the Black Lives Matter movement, Mckesson and his team created Campaign Zero—a ten-point policy plan for police reform.  Campaign Zero has already aided in the implementation of reform, as the police chief of Orlando, Fla. changed the police department’s policy on use of force following a meeting with the organization.

Mckesson was the keynote speaker for George Washington University's 2017 Black Heritage Celebration. Photograph by Michael Ferrier

Mckesson was the keynote speaker for George Washington University's 2017 Black Heritage Celebration. Photograph by Michael Ferrier

Ideas of systematic reparation do not instantly convert the American conscious.  They will take time to be tolerated because they must erode the decades of societal conditioning that portrays the inferiority and dangerousness of peoples of color.  The ideas of control and ‘making America great again’ war against ideas of equality and civil rights.  The battleground is all around us—framed by our television sets and news feeds, but ideas are indoctrinated into American society because of our neighbors, friends and family.

Mckesson, who openly identifies as homosexual, related this notion to the fight for victory in same-sex marriage law.  “The gay marriage fight finally won because regular people went around to their peers and were like, ‘You know gay people.  Your cousin’s gay, your sister’s gay…Don’t you think they should be able to marry?’  That nuts and bolts organizing is how we were able to change hearts and minds.”

“We believe that the best idea wins. That the right idea will somehow magically be the idea that wins.  And history tells us that’s not true.  The idea we fight for the most is the idea that wins.  The idea that we beat into people’s head over and over again is the idea that wins.”

The organization of these notions of equality and racial justice into tangible solutions is what Mckesson aims to accomplish next.

“The works of our celebrities and the people who make the culture have to be a real part of how we organize…their platforms are so big that every time they offer ideas, they offer more people to participate in the conversation.  What would it look like to have canvases in every neighborhood in America ready to change hearts and minds, ready to push people and ideas? What would it look like to have nationwide telephone banks, so that people can mobilize at the drop of a hat?  What would it look like to give every single black and brown kid in poverty a library?  A set of books from birth to college; that to me is what real organizing would look like in this moment.”

RIP Mr. Rooney 1932-2017 /  by Maxwell Young

Last Thursday, Pittsburgh lost a native son.  Dan Rooney, former chairman of the Pittsburgh Steelers and United States Ambassador to Ireland, passed away at the age of 84.

Mr. Rooney was born in 1932, one year before his father, Art "The Chief" Rooney founded the Pittsburgh Pirates Football Club--or the first iteration of the Steelers.  At five years old, he was already involved with the franchise working as a water boy, and he later met his wife, Patricia, in the office of the Steelers where she was working.

Much of the successes of the Steelers and that of the National Football League are due to Mr. Rooney's contributions.  It was Mr. Rooney, the general manager, who selected Chuck Noll to lead the team from mediocrity in 1969 to a record four Super Bowl victories during the Steel Curtain Dynasty.  It was Mr. Rooney, the former accounting major from Duquesne University, who crafted the modern unrestricted free agent system in 1992 that resulted in higher player salaries.  And it was Mr. Rooney, the owner, who urged the NFL to create more opportunities for minorities to earn high-level coaching and administrative positions in what ultimately became known as the 'Rooney Rule'.

Mr. Rooney had a lifelong commitment to advancing the relationship between the American and Irish people.  In 1976, he and former CEO of the H.J. Heinz Corporation, Anthony O'Reilly, founded the Ireland Fund, which promotes peace, culture, and charity.  The nongovernmental organization has increased its world exposure, sprouting chapters in 12 other countries and has raised over $550 million since its inception.  Mr. Rooney's nationalist relations with Ireland also made him an apt choice to serve as the US Ambassador to the country under President Barack Obama. From July 1st, 2009 to December 14th, 2012, Ambassador Rooney served his appointment, and to date, he is the only ambassador to have visited all 32 counties in Ireland. 

Despite his world adventures and despite the level of prominence he elevated the Steelers franchise, Mr. Rooney always considered the North Side of Pittsburgh to be his home.  He was an accessible man, walking to Pirates games and frequenting local spots in the neighborhood, like Gus & Yia Yia's storied icy ball stand or Legends, an Italian-style eatery next to Allegheny General Hospital.  Tailgaters could mingle with the owner on game days as he traveled the five minutes down North Shore Drive from his house to Heinz Field in a black golf cart.

Dan Rooney is survived by his wife, Patricia, and their seven children.  The eldest of them is Art Rooney II, the current owner of the Pittsburgh Steelers.  His memory lives on in the hearts and minds of Steelers past and present as well as inside the people of Pittsburgh.  Following his death, Obama recounted his friendship with Mr. Rooney saying, "he was a model citizen and someone who represented the United States with dignity and grace on the world stage...a championship-caliber good man."

A public viewing is being held for Dan Rooney later this afternoon at Heinz Field from 2pm to 7pm at the PNC Champions Club inside the stadium.  On Tuesday, a funeral mass is scheduled to take place at Saint Paul Cathedral in Oakland. 

 

"Her Power" /  by Alex Young

Tori Meglio next to Baron Batch grenade in Big Dog Coffee - photograph by Alex Young

Tori Meglio next to Baron Batch grenade in Big Dog Coffee - photograph by Alex Young

Tori Meglio, a 22-year-old from Pittsburgh, is the brand manager for artist Baron Batch and creative collective Studio A.M. She introduces local communities to Batch's artwork and the encouraging atmospheres that Studio A.M. provides, like Sunday brunch. Meglio is mindful of her interactions with amazing women and men throughout the city. Though her work is cool, it's also professional. Curating display spaces for Batch's artwork in the Heinz History Center or collaborating with local businesses like Threads On Carson to celebrate "Her Power," Meglio is prideful of her presence in the city. Her confident personality allows her to navigate business waters that men think they own. In a brief interview below, learn how Meglio impacts equality, puts men in check and still enjoys the workplace because she could meet Mr. Right on the job.

Meglio: First, let me explain where I've been with politics in the past nine months. I have successfully never watched a video of Donald Trump. None of my social media feeds have that. I plug my ears. That's not my battle to fight. So, I have come to this realization that it's the one-on-one interactions you have with people every day that will change the perception of what women are. By me holding myself as the kind of woman that I am and how I interact with men will change the perception of all men in the future. The way that I interact with women will change that perception. Be kind, and that's how I am going to make change. Every day, every woman I talk to I'm engaged. 'What project are you working on? How are you doing? What are you into?' It's about going deeper, making people think about themselves and respect themselves because they are accomplished in some sort of way and are proud of what they're doing. There's an impact I can make by doing that. 

ITR: Why is it difficult for women and men to collaborate with mutual respect and an appropriate professional relationship?

Meglio: I think there's two scenarios, there's the mature man and there's the immature man. The mature man probably approached me to do business with him, or the way we have come to collaborate we have mutual respect for each other. So he is respectful because he understands what's going on. Also, I'm never afraid to say what the boundaries are. Some people never say that out loud and if you don't say it out loud before it's a problem the immature man could flip it on you, 'wow, why would you ever say that?!' Like, yo, it's just for the record. This is more about me than him.

I've also found that, I'm 22-years-old right, it's time to date people, work is a great place to find a special person. Think about all of our parents who met at work or these people you find out they met at work. That's totally cool. That means you have the same interests. I hope it just didn't affect your work, or if you met them at work you then had other jobs. I would hate for you to have to put your feelings with your significant other into your work unless you really wanted to.

ITR: How does Baron Batch represent women fairly?

He's doing a wonderful job because for Baron it's not about saying 'make a woman your business and project manager.' He's like, 'My business is thriving and I have a woman doing it and she is doing a bomb-ass job.' It's much more about leading by example than verbalizing. I think he would just hire the best person of any race or any orientation for the job with the right timing. Beyond Baron, people who can work with all types of people have welcoming work environments.

 

Discover more about Tori and her involvement with Baron Batch and Studio A.M. here. May we absorb their legendary movements as a creative collective more thoroughly soon.