Apr
4
Louis Reyes Rivera and Elizabeth Catlett
On The Passing of Two Giants
This has been a difficult month, what with the loss of poet and activist Louis Reyes Rivera, and even more recently the esteemed artist Elizabeth Catlett. Both Rivera and Catlett were artists who were unabashedly forthright in their adherence to the cause of social justice, and equally as forthright in their adherence to practicing at the highest level of of their respective art forms.
Both believed that their deep belief in the experience of working people, people of color, and people maligned by the ruthless class, could be elevated, transformed, and made resonant through exquisite articulation, through the marshaling of a considerable history of literary and visual art practice, in order to move that practice forward with integrity through their own work.
This has been a difficult month, what with the loss of poet and activist Louis Reyes Rivera, and even more recently the esteemed artist Elizabeth Catlett. Both Rivera and Catlett were artists who were unabashedly forthright in their adherence to the cause of social justice, and equally as forthright in their adherence to practicing at the highest level of of their respective art forms.
Both believed that their deep belief in the experience of working people, people of color, and people maligned by the ruthless class, could be elevated, transformed, and made resonant through exquisite articulation, through the marshaling of a considerable history of literary and visual art practice, in order to move that practice forward with integrity through their own work.