Partisan politics render Congress dysfunctional. From a year’s subscription to The Congressional Record, I folded 10,752 paper airplanes, striped them red or blue, and installed them in opposing bins, rising into the air in squadron-like formation. Those that bridged the divide took on the color purple, the color of reason in politics.
In 1895, Edvard Munch created his iconic pastel painting, The Scream. This re-imagining of it is drawn using Donald Trump quotations. The railings and sidewalk provide a timeline in which the horror of the Covid-19 pandemic slowly unfolds.
The 1868 Fort Laramie treaty returned the Black Hills of South Dakota to Native Americans. Six years later, when an expedition led by General Custer found gold, the treaty unraveled. Fifty years after Congress officially broke the treaty, the carving of Mt. Rushmore began, indelibly claiming this sacred land.
Paul Cadmus died just three years after enactment of the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA). Cadmus’ drawing of his partner of thirty years is redrawn here using the Writ of Certiorari and the testimony before the U.S. Supreme Court in the Windsor case (2013) which successfully sought the repeal of Section 3 of DOMA.
This companion piece, again a re-creation of a Cadmus drawing, is realized using the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision in the Windsor case.
America has already experienced three straight years of increases in our homeless population. Because of COVID-19, it is expected that an additional quarter of a million people will be homeless, literally living on the streets, by the end of this year. Surplus is created from the rubble of a Chevy Chase, Maryland sidewalk.
Mass shootings happen when angry, troubled individuals have access to firearms. With the pull of a trigger, they deny their victims the foremost right upon which our country was founded–the inalienable right to life. Each person who argues against common sense gun legislation is also complicit in this denial.
Americans spend over one billion dollars each year on child safety items: car seats, bike helmets, water wings. But what are we doing to keep them psychologically safe? As you walk through this art installation, you will hear voices recounting their hurts that haven’t healed, their stories of bullying, social isolation, neglect, abuse.
I have interviewed hundreds of people in dozens of states to understand our nation’s continuing drug addiction crisis. Learn about my travels and preview the seven art installations created to decrease stigma. You’ll learn what makes some people more vulnerable and see what it takes to conquer addiction.