Firebird. Acrylic & charcoal on canvas, 48 x 48 inches. © 2012 by Kathy Crabbe

I’ve been reading a lot about revolution these days trying to figure out how I, as an artist can make a difference and contribute socially to our society and often I feel quite hopeless until I listen to what women artist activists have to say and then I start to feel hope again; for art, artists, and for humanity. Here’s an example of what I mean. Below is a quotation by Gale Jackson, librarian, storyteller and historian from the book Art on the Line

“We’re talking about human education here. That’s when you talk about seizing traditional forms, the arts, traditional forms of reaching people, and turning them modern and figuring out how to teach these lessons again because somehow people have watched too many commercials not realizing that culturally, or through the lack thereof, we’ve been pushed to the brink of survival, against the wall, literally to the edge of the fatal possibilities of the world we’re living in. Somehow you have to reach people and bring them back, mindful that peace will only come with justice. That eye for eye for eye could go on and on. Somehow you have to reach people ’cause we have to talk. There are a lot of things that, for starters, we need to learn and remember. A lot of history has been taken away from people and one of the first restitutions would be to begin to restore. People’s very stories have been taken away, made inaccessible, till we don’t all know who we are. Culturally. Till we don’t have no home. Real or metaphoric. Then there is all that is going on that is not being told. The news. Our country’s not-so-covert wars. In my work as a writer, as a librarian, I be finding that people don’t know. This tragedy of repetition. When it becomes clear that culture, art information, is first and foremost political, it is clear that people need to use that to reach and teach. To explore. People need to know. To imagine. To know.”

~ Gale Jackson, Art on the Line, Essays by Artists about the Point Where Their Art and Activism Intersect

Links:
Art on the Line ~ edited by Jack Hirschman
Gale Jackson
Chris Hedges ~ Truth Dig
Revolution Truth

My painting, Firebird (above) expresses the fiery passion and hope that burns brightly within my soul; it depicts the spark within us that can never die or be extinguished even through death.

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