Art is… Complicated. It can evoke emotion, anger, and laughter.

But when an art piece is called controversial, especially by lawmakers or a political party, it becomes newsworthy.

The pigs are coming

David Pulphus’ Untitled #1 is under fire. Pulphus, a Missouri high school student, created art that depicts police officers as animals.

The art was first displayed in the Capitol in June 2016 and was part of the Congressional Arts Competition.

As you can imagine, some officials—specifically Rep. Duncan Hunter of California, and Reps. Dana Rohrabacher of California and Brian Babin of Texas—are taking issue with the art.

Over the past few weeks, the trio of GOP lawmakers have removed the art from its position two times. The ruckus has attracted conservative media and garnered criticism from a smattering of law enforcement groups.

Other lawmakers, including Rep. William Lacy Clay, D-Mo and members of The Congressional Black Caucus, are not happy with the Republican lawmakers’ antics.

Black Lives Matter… and so does black art

David Pulphus lives in the congressional district that includes Ferguson, Missouri, where in 2014, a  police officer shot and killed Michael Brown, a young, black man, leading to riots and outrage not just in Ferguson, but across the country.

Rep. Clay governs the district and thinks Pulphus’ work is a depiction of how the high school artist interprets the world. Clay appreciates the art and thinks there’s nothing wrong with it.

Yes!

Excuse our excitement, but this politician’s thoughts are refreshing. If young people and their points of view upset the establishment because it makes some officials uncomfortable, well then, good for them. Good for all of us.

This artist is depicting how he and many other Americans feel. Not every police officer is a sexist or a racist—the majority of law officials are great—but lets be honest. Many police officers could benefit from racial and gender sensitivity courses.

Pulphus: We congratulate you. You made a strong impact and that’s what real art does.

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Fashion can be beautiful, inspiring, moving. But now, thanks to Erykah Badu and Kerby Jean-Raymond, it’s also empowering and educational.

Badu, singer and all-around creative, and Jean-Raymond, the brains behind high-end fashion label Pyer Moss, partnered to create a clothing line dedicated to spreading mental health awareness.

DOUBLE BIND

Badu was drawn to Jean-Raymond’s creative direction because of the message DOUBLE BIND, the line, is conveying.

“DOUBLE BIND is a term that describes two conflicting ideas,” Badu says. “Bi-polar disorder or depression is a subject that is discussed very little in our community [the black community] and is over shadowed by what people would rather call crazy. As racism and sexism and genderism and prejudice take the main stage on our screens, perhaps, recognize that depression may be at the very root of it all. Hurt people…HURT people.”

Although Jean-Raymond’s new line has raised quite a few eyebrows, the designer is used to his work ruffling feathers.

To drive home just how much the black community needs to embrace mental illness awareness, Jean-Raymond dedicated part of his collection to MarShawn McCarrel, a Black Lives Matter activist who killed himself on the steps of the Ohio State House. To remember the activist’s life, Jean-Raymond had a model carry a sign printed with McCarrel’s last social media posting: “My demons won today. I’m sorry.”

The rest of Jean-Raymond’s new collection contained “sweatshirts that advised people to seek professional help should they experience a list of emotions and neutral colored tops with a statement the designer probably heard once before: ‘You don’t have any friends in L.A,’”  Teen Vogue reports.

Black Lives Matter

Jean-Raymond’s collections are personal. The Fall 2o16 collection was a direct response to the depression he felt following his spring 2016 show, which featured clothing inspired by Black Lives Matter.

While Jean-Raymond was inspired to creatively reflect on the movement because of many personal experiences, there was one instance that really influenced his spring 2016 line.

In early February, the designer told Vice a terrifying story.  Jean-Raymond was walking through his neighborhood one evening. He had recently had his arm set in a cast. As he was walking, the designer lifted his casted arm to scratch his face and immediately heard someone yell, “Put it down!”

“He turned to his left and saw three police officers pointing their firearms at his body. They thought his cast was a gun,” Vice reports.

“I felt like I wanted to piss on myself,” Jean-Raymond says. “I just yelled, ‘It’s a cast! It’s a cast! It’s a cast!'”

Mental Health Fashion

While all of the clothing and accessories in Jean-Raymond and Badu’s Fall 2016 line were related to mental health awareness, the designers also wanted to convey that these hidden diseases hurt everyone, Huffington Post reports.

“Kerby [Jean-Raymond] wanted to communicate that working-class people deal with depression every day,” Badu says. “The deeper conversation needed to be had and I think through this performance art and fashion show it was discussed. And hopefully creates a little dialogue about it — a little more than usual.”

Obviously, Jean-Raymond is making waves in the fashion world for good reason. We can’t wait to see what he will creatively interpret next year.

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Image via Pyer Moss’ Facebook page

The post Making Mental Health Fashionable appeared first on EcoSalon.

“Love Actually” begins with a cheesy voiceover narrated by Hugh Grant. Grant says, with strained sincerity, that “love, actually, is all around.” Well, you know what, actually, is all around these days? Racism, stupidity, and bigotry.

Sorry to be such a killjoy, but the last six months have really brought me down…

Why am I filled with doom and gloom? Since Eric Garner’s death on July 17th, an insane number of unarmed black men (and in one case, a 12-year-old boy) have been killed by police officers. And these types of deaths are nothing new. Young black men have been getting unjustly killed in America for years.

To add insult to injury, the officers that were involved in Garner and Michael Brown’s (Brown was the young black man who was shot and killed by a police officer in Ferguson, Mo. on August 9) deaths were not indicted by their respective Grand Juries. The news of Darren Wilson, Brown’s killer, not getting indicted hit me like a gut punch. “But there was no video,” people said. “How can you really know for sure?” Then came the news that Garner’s killer wasn’t going to be indicted, either. That death is on tape. You can distinctly hear him fainting yelling, “I can’t breathe.”

How in the hell can these incidents continue to happen? I guess if I’m totally honest, I’m not surprised for a few reasons.

While I grew up in a hippie, civil rights spewing household, many of my peers did not. I come from northeastern Kansas. This is a very white, conservative region. Many of my acquaintances in junior high and high school were openly bigoted. I know too well what a lot of people think when they see a black man (or a black woman, for that matter). These people – these sad, ignorant people – get scared. Their fear leads to taunting, and the taunting eventually leads to a sense of entitlement. These types of people are everywhere, though. They aren’t all centered in my small hometown.

Over the past few months it has become increasingly apparent that there are people everywhere who think that black lives don’t matter. Sure, these people probably don’t frame their opinions in such a stark manner, but when you’re openly criticizing people for protesting unjust deaths, you are part of the problem. We need protest. We need uprising. If people don’t fight back with words, protests, and letters, then institutional racism will continue.

Another reason why I’m not surprised that “this” is all happening is because of my experience as a female victim of violence. When I first began to disclose to people that I had been assaulted, I was often met with questions like, “are you sure? Did you lead him on? Did you do something?” These questions are the same types of questions that many women who get assaulted hear, and this is why many of them don’t go to the authorities. There is an inherent distrust of people taking you – a woman’s – accusation seriously.

Now, this experience is in no way similar to unjust shootings and killings of unarmed black men. I have no idea what it’s like to be black. All I know is what it feels like to be scared and in public, not knowing if I’m safe — I often feel like everyone (men, women, young and old) is a threat. I can only imagine that that feeling is felt by many black people, a million times over, when they are walking down a street, minding their own business, and a cop car suddenly slows.

The only way that the public can rally behind our fellow citizens and support young black males is to continue to protest. Make noise — let authorities know that none of this is OK. “Hands Up, Don’t Shoot,” and “I Can’t Breathe,” are the new battle cries that everyone – white, black… whatever – needs to exclaim loudly and often. We can’t stop. Black lives matter.

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Image: Tim Pierce

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