Black Lives Matter

BLACK LIVES MATTER

Garden stands in solidarity with Black Lives Matter and the protests and outrage following the murder of George Floyd and countless other Black people at the hands of the police. We support the important work that is happening right now in this historic moment. We advocate abolishing the police, abolishing mass incarceration and the prison-industrial complex, abolishing white supremacy and imperialism, and abolishing capitalism.

Arts organizations, even small ones in second bedrooms, must be accountable to their communities. As two white people working in art, we are thinking critically about how we engage in and benefit from white supremacy daily. The following is the beginning of an evolving list of concrete actions we pledge to take to support the voices of Black, Indigenous, and People of Color in our community:

  • Amplify the voices of BIPOC artists. We can do much better to offer opportunities to BIPOC artists. We pledge to go on more studio visits, plan more programming, and hold more exhibitions with Black artists. Our program focuses on art with ecological themes – we know there are many artists who we are not currently engaging and are essential voices in this dialogue. There are various structural reasons why these artists might not be on our radar and it is our job to do the necessary research and outreach.
  • Pledge to not call the police during any of our events (or ever). The police were created to repress enslaved people, BIPOC, and the working class. They do not provide safety for our community so we will not call them.
  • Residential backyard garden space available for organizing and programming. Please get in touch if our backyard space would be useful for your organizing, programming, or caregiving. For a seated talk or discussion, our yard can hold up to about 30 people comfortably.
  • Continue to support Black-led causes and organizations through fundraising, donations, protest attendance, calling representatives, volunteering, and signal boosting. 
  • As art world professionals, we offer Reparations in the form of writing or editing artist statements, bios, and resumes, and providing any exhibition or career advice or knowledge that might be of use.
  • BIPOC Ecologies reading list hosted on Garden and Earth Sciences: grdn.la/reading-list. We hope for this list to be generative and open-ended, so please get in touch with any reading suggestions.

Sincerely,
Zach and Britte