AgitProp News: Harriet Tubman - Armed and Dangerous
Alewitz, Mike (Art)
AgitProp News: 6.17.00
Special Issue: Harriet Tubman: Armed and Dangerous
In This Issue:
1. Harriet Tubman: Armed and Dangerous 2. I Will Not Disarm
Harriet Tubman 3. A Rare and Authentic Dialogue 4. What are "The
Dreams of Harriet Tubman" 5. Abolitionist's Rifle Engulfs N.J.
Artist in Fray 6. Nothing Will Stop this Historic Endeavor 7.
Statement by Baltimore Clayworks 8. Statement by Mike Alewitz
______________________________________
1. Harriet Tubman: Armed and Dangerous
USA Today Wednesday, June 7
Baltimore - A 25-foot-high ceramic mural of a musket-toting Harriet
Tubman leading slaves to liberation on the Underground Railroad
has upset the group that had planned to display it. Associated
Black Charities Inc. says the piece could be construed as racist
and violent. The group asked artist Mike Alewitz to replace the
musket with a staff, but he refused. Tubman, a Maryland native, is
the subject of five Alewitz murals to be installed throughout the
state this summer.
_________________________________________
2. I Will Not Disarm Harriet Tubman
Mural of armed Tubman stirs protest Artist won't change piece for
black charity
By Jamie Stiehm Sun Staff
Dispute: Officials of Associated Black Charities Inc., the organization
for which the mural is intended, have asked the artist to replace
Harriet Tubman's musket with a staff.
- - - - An artist refused yesterday to alter his government-funded
mural as he prepared to meet with members of Associated Black
Charities Inc., who balked at putting it on their building because
they believe it paints a racially loaded portrait of Harriet Tubman
and the Underground Railroad. Strong emotions were apparent last
night over the 25-foot-high ceramic Mural planned for display this
month at Associated's headquarters at Cathedral And Chase streets.
The work portrays Tubman with a musket, leading slaves to freedom
through a symbolic, parting Red Sea. The images of whites in the
work - they are being tossed into the sea from either a slave ship
or a factory - and Tubman handling a musket set people off, even
before a gathering to discuss the mural last night at the McKim
Center, a former Quaker meeting house on Aisquith Street.
The mural creates a powerful image, but one that could be construed
as racist and condoning violence, say charity directors. It is not
something to display on an outside wall at a time when guns are
too often linked with violence in the black community, charity
officials say.
Associated leaders have urged artist Mike Alewitz - chosen in a
national competition sponsored jointly by the White House Millennium
Council and the National Endowment for the Arts - to substitute a
peaceful staff for the musket.
Alewitz likens this to censorship: "I will not disarm Harriet
Tubman. I won't take [the musket] out of her hands," he said in a
telephone interview before the meeting.
The 25-by-123-foot mural is designed to be in public view. It has
raised questions about historical truth vs. contemporary perceptions,
issues that separate whites and blacks. Some tried to bridge that
gulf at last night's meeting.
The community coordinator of the statewide Harriet Tubman mural
project defended the artist's choice. "[Tubman] did not lead a
revolution with a feather," said Blaise DePaolo.
A Maryland native who led slaves to freedom, Tubman is the subject
of Five murals to be installed throughout the state this summer,
one in her birthplace, Cambridge.
Through a national Millennial Treasures campaign launched by Hillary
Rodham Clinton, Baltimore Clayworks won a $25,000 grant to develop
the Harriet Tubman motif. The Mount Washington ceramics center
chose Alewitz, who Lives in New Jersey, from a national pool of
hundreds of artists. He designed All five murals.
The others are set for display at Magnolia Middle School in Harford
County, a park in Hyattsville in Prince George's County and the
University of Maryland, Eastern Shore.
If the Associated refuses to take the mural as Alewitz conceived
it, Baltimore Clayworks will find another site for it in the city,
said Deborah Bedwell, the executive director.
Originally published on Jun 6 2000
________________________________________
3. A Rare and Authentic Dialogue
(The first sentence of this letter, where the writer identifies
herself as an African-American, was deleted by the Baltimore Sun.)
After reading Jamie Stiehm's account of the June 5 community meeting
concerning the mural "The Dreams of Harriet Tubman," I have to
wonder if the reporter and I attended the same meeting ("Mural of
armed Tubman stirs protest," June 6).
The meeting provided a forum for the artist, Mike Alewitz, and
representatives from Baltimore Clayworks and the Mid-Atlantic Arts
Foundation to explain the scope of the statewide public art project
and for citizens, community leaders and national experts on Harriet
Tubman to discuss their feelings about the work.
While there was a great deal of discussion about the image of the
rifle In Tubman's hand, it was neither initiated nor fueled by
representatives of Associated Black Charities Inc. (ABC).
Ms. Stiehm mentioned that the artist is white, but failed to mention
that a white male raised the greatest objections to the gun in the
mural. She neglected to acknowledge that a number of attendees,
black and white, found the rendering to be passive compared with
the savage violence endured by the enslaved.
In short, Ms. Stiehm portrayed the meeting as divided along racial
lines. It certainly was not.
Ms. Stiehm also states that ABC leaders "balked" at having a mural
that "paints a racially loaded portrait of Harriet Tubman and the
Underground Railroad" on their wall and claimed that "an armed
depiction of the Freedom fighter is inappropriate for the building"
and that some people have Urged the artist "to substitute a peaceful
staff for the musket." None of this Is true.
In fact, ABC leaders pointed out emphatically that they had no
desire to censor the art.
Donna Jones Stanley, ABC's executive director, stated that people
who Are opposed to the rifle's presence are angry and more vocal
than those who Are not, and that she did not want to place the
agency in the position of defending a mural. She, and members of
her staff, attended the meeting to hear the comments of members of
the communities her agency serves.
Also, for the record, Mr. Alewitz was not "chosen in a national
Competition sponsored jointly by the White House Millennium Council
and the National Endowment for the Arts." And, Clayworks did not
win a "$25,000 grant to develop the Harriet Tubman motif through
a national Millennial Treasures program."
Baltimore Clayworks selected Mr. Alewitz from a pool of artists
after it received an award in recognition of its commitment to
community arts programs.
It is impossible to engage in honest and open discourse about the
life and times of Harriet Tubman without discussing the issues of
race, slavery and racism.
The images in the mural provoked thought, commentary and questions,
and resulted in a rare and authentic dialogue.
The artist's depiction of Ms. Tubman's dream touches on issues and
Events that many wish to marginalize or ignore. The discussion
served to open Eyes and minds and hearts, as good art always does.
It's unfortunate that Ms. Stiehm twisted the spirit of the debate
and misconstrued it as a racially divided meeting.
Jannette J. Witmyer Baltimore The writer is a member of the board
of Baltimore Clayworks.
Originally published on Jun 14 2000
__________________________________________
4. What are "The Dreams of Harriet Tubman"
The Dreams of Harriet Tubman
The importance of Harriet Tubman's life lies not in the past, but
in the future. At a time when African-Americans were kept as
chattel, when even the abolitionist forces were riddled with the
racism and bigotry of the time, Harriet Tubman and thousands of
anti-slavery activists organized an effective liberation struggle
which divided and conquered the forces of reaction. Their will
to triumph, in the face of tremendous adversity, is an inspiration
for those who struggle for social justice today.
The Dreams of Harriet Tubman will give visual expression to this
great movement, one of the seminal points in American and world
history. Dreams will be a necklace of murals painted across
Maryland. They will form one unified work.
Moses
The murals will be anchored by a dramatic image on a major wall in
the city of Baltimore. This mural will depict Harriet Tubman a
she was known: Moses. Harriet will be shown parting the seas of
reaction, as she did in her life. Her staff is the musket that
she carried. The children of Israel are the slave armies who
resisted their bondage and joined the union ranks to defeat the
south.
Among this army will march the freedom fighters of the slave era,
like Sojourner Truth and Robert Gould. But the army will also
include those of more recent times: Martin Luther King, Malcolm X,
Mumia Abu Jamal and others. Drowning in the tide will be Pharoahs
tribe: the slavers, the KKK, Nazis backward politicians and the
other forces of reaction.
Harriet's massive skirts will be a quilt of silhouettes formed by
tracing the outlines of visitors to the site, who will climb the
lower rungs of the scaffold and stand against the wall. In this
way the living activists of today will become a part of the
mural...literally the body of Harriet Tubman.
Dreams
Throughout her life, Harriet experienced visions or dreams that
inspired her actions. At the sides of the mural, and in the smaller
walls in other localities will be a series of vignettes based on
those visions.
At the Harriet Tubman Park in Cambridge, her birthplace, a monument
will be specifically constructed. The small mural will depict her
birth as a symbolic beginning of the anti-slavery movement as it
changed from heroic acts of individual resistance to a mass struggle
of liberation.
All the murals will contain common visual elements meant to weave
the dreams together. Included in this will be ceramic tile elements
created by project volunteers. These tiles will form borders around
the painted images, as well as singular pieces within the painted
areas.
The images will depict some of the important chapters of Harriets
life: - Her dreams about the Amistad and Nat Turner slave
rebellions, which inspired the beginnings of the abolitionist
struggle - Experience as a slave and a worker, her work with
Frederick Douglass and other abolitionists who had a deep understanding
the class relationships at play in the war against slavery - Her
success as a builder and conductor of the Underground Railroad -
Collaboration with John Brown and his organization for the raid on
Harpers Ferry, an event which animated the liberation struggle for
decades to come - Leadership as a spy, scout and guerilla in the
military conquest of the south, despite the prejudices against her
as both an African-American and a woman - Early championing of
the women's suffrage movement and participation in the first wave
of American feminism - Experience as a nurse and educator under
radical reconstruction, and the attempt to hold in check the awakened
aspirations of black America
Taken as a whole, The Dreams of Harriet Tubman will provide a
glimpse of the past and a vision for the future. It will look at
the Civil War as the ending of an era and the beginning of the
emergence of the United States as a modern nation. It will register
the gains for human rights won with the suppression of slavery.
It will face with honesty the limitations of that victory and the
need to continue the struggle to which Harriet Tubman dedicated
her life.
Mike Alewitz Muralist May 1, 2000
______________________________________
4. Abolitionist's Rifle Engulfs N.J. Artist in Fray
Abolitionist's rifle engulfs N.J. artist in fray
06/13/00
By John Yocca STAFF WRITER
Her every step a perilous one, famed abolitionist Harriet Tubman
could afford no slip-ups as she shuttled slaves to freedom through
the Underground Railroad.
Timing was tight, indecision an enemy. When escaped slaves in her
care hesitated on the frightening march to liberation, Tubman, a
determined and gritty former slave herself, coaxed them northward
with a loaded gun.
A century-and-a-half later, New Jersey artist Mike Alewitz chose
that Image of Tubman -- a lantern in one hand, a rifle in the other
-- as the centerpiece for one of five sprawling ceramic murals he
fashioned for the state of Maryland, Tubman's birthplace.
For Alewitz, the depiction is appropriate, both historically accurate
And symbolic of the danger Tubman faced as she led more than 300
slaves out Of captivity. But the artist's creation has been less
than well received by The nonprofit group that was to display the
work on an exterior wall in Baltimore this month.
In a case that pits historical realism against modern sensitivity
to the Gun violence gripping American cities, Associated Black
Charities says it Will likely turn down the piece because the weapon
in Tubman's hand sends the wrong message.
"We feel that in the year 2000, it is inappropriate for a piece of
artwork depicting guns and violence to be displayed on our wall in
Baltimore, which had more than 300 murders last year," said Donna
Jones Stanley, 44, the group's executive director. "This is an
organization that strengthens the fabric of the African-American
community, and I'm not sure this depiction helps us as a community
to strengthen ourselves."
Stressing that she is opposed to censorship and that she finds
Alewitz's work aesthetically moving, Stanley nevertheless said her
group must be careful about what it places on its high-profile
building, visible up to a mile away.
"It is a very prominent building," Stanley said. "That means we
have a lot of responsibility, and we take that responsibility very
seriously."
Today, the nonprofit's board of directors will vote on whether to
accept The mural. Stanley said she's confident the board will back
her Recommendation to pass on the work.
That's fine with Alewitz, 49, an internationally acclaimed, New
Brunswick-based artist who refused a compromise request by Associated
Black Charities to turn the rifle into a less controversial staff.
"They don't have an objection to Harriet Tubman," Alewitz said.
"They have an objection to Harriet Tubman with a rifle. It's like
you want to see wolves in the wild -- but without teeth. They can
refuse the mural, and that's their right. We'll find another wall."
The mural, a 25-foot-high, 130-foot-wide tiled mosaic, is one of
five Alewitz created for Baltimore Clayworks, a ceramic arts group
that Funded the venture with a $25,000 grant from the Mid-Atlantic
Arts Foundation. Baltimore Clayworks chose Alewitz from among
hundreds of artists across The country.
All five works feature Tubman, a native of Dorchester County, Md.
Blaise DePaolo, the group's community programs coordinator, said
Clayworks stands behind Alewitz in the controversy and will find
someplace else to display the mural if it's turned away.
The mosaic depicts Tubman as Moses parting the sea, an army of
liberated slaves and freedom fighters amassed behind her. On one
side of the work, white figures, representing slave masters, are
tossed from a boat in the roiling water.
Experts call the gun-wielding woman in the mural an accurate
Representation of Tubman, the most famous "conductor" on the
Underground Railroad, the network of people committed to help slaves
find freedom. Tubman and Others brought escaped slaves from
safehouse to safehouse on an arduous trek north. Many of those
stops were in New Jersey, including Cape May, where Tubman worked
in hotels.
The trip was dicey business. If caught, escaped slaves and those
who Helped them faced severe punishment, often death.
Taking no chances, Tubman, who escaped slavery at age 29, armed
herself With a pistol. And she wasn't shy about waving it around
to make a point.
"Sometimes she would hold a pistol to the slaves' heads and say
something like, 'Dead people don't tell no tales,' " said Kay
McElvey, a member of a research and information team for the Harriet
Tubman organization in Cambridge, Md. "Sometimes she carried rifles
as well."
For Alewitz, the Tubman theme was a natural fit. He's made a career
of working on behalf of the underdog, the oppressed and the working
class.
An ardent opponent of the Vietnam War during the late 1960s and
early 1970s, he later focused on labor causes. As the artist in
residence for the New Jersey Industrial Union Council AFL-CIO, he
designed signs and banners For striking union workers.
Alewitz also serves as artistic director for the Labor, Art and
Mural Project, which is in the process of moving from Rutgers
University to Central Connecticut State University in New Britain,
Conn.
A 10-year New Jersey resident, Alewitz has traveled around the
world to paint murals, some of them with a decidedly political
bent. And while he's not one to back down from a confrontation,
he's not ruffled by the Baltimore flap.
"It's a work of art. They're blowing it out of proportion," he
said. "It's one person's expression. You don't have to agree with
it."
______________________________________
6. Nothing Will Stop this Historic Endeavor
Tubman mural with musket is rejected Associated Black Charities
decides artwork conveys wrong image for office -------------- By
Jamie Stiehm Sun Staff
Saying it doesn't reflect their image, the Associated Black Charities
boardunanimously rejected last night a contentious mural of Harriet
Tubman carrying a musket, which was intended for its downtown
building at Cathedral and Chase streets.
Mural artist Mike Alewitz and staffers from Baltimore Clayworks,
which commissioned the work, searched yesterday for "appropriately
visible" sites and walls in the city for the larger-than-life image,
which was originally planned to stand 25 feet tall on a wall facing
Meyerhoff Symphony Hall.
"It needs to be a good public wall," Alewitz said.
"It's fine if it's not a good fit," Deborah Bedwell, executive
director of Clayworks, said before last night's vote. Clayworks,
a Mount Washington nonprofit, chose Alewitz to portray the Underground
Railroad leader in five works to be installed in Maryland as part
of a Mid-Atlantic Arts Council project. She said his work centers
on social justice themes.
The musket in the mural design stirred an outcry about historical
truth vs. contemporary reality.
Some suggested that Alewitz's design, showing Tubman holding a
musket as she symbolically parts a Red Sea and leads slaves to
freedom, condones gun violence.
The issue triggered debate about whether it was appropriate for
Associated Black Charities' public wall in a city that records at
least 300 homicides a year.
"It has started the community discussing slavery, race and history,"
said Donna Jones Stanley, the Associated executive director, who
recommended against Alewitz's design.
Since 1985, the Associated has been a leading presence in the black
community, giving nearly $6 million in grants to programs benefiting
the greater Baltimore area.
It is agreed Tubman carried a gun for protection, but Stanley
declared, "It is not historically correct. She carried a pistol,
not a rifle. It's his vision, but it's our wall."
A few urged Alewitz to substitute a staff for the musket. He refused
last week, saying, "I will not disarm Harriet Tubman. ... There
was nothing safe about her." Phillip Sterling and Rayford Logan
wrote in "Four Took Freedom"that Tubman made 11 trips from Maryland
to Canada from 1852 to 1857, leadingabout 300 to freedom. "Her most
famous trip concerned a passenger who panicked and wanted to turn
back. Tubman was afraid if he left he would tortured and would tell
all he knew. The unwilling passenger changed his mind when Tubman
pointed a gun at his head and said 'dead folks tell no tales.'"
Said Alewitz: "Nothing will stop this historic endeavor. Harriet
Tubman will live on the walls of Maryland."
______________________________________
7. Statement by Baltimore Clayworks
To: Baltimore Clayworks' friends, members of the Board of Directors,
Millennium Honorary Committee Members, interested members of the
broader community From: Baltimore Clayworks - June 14, 2000 Re:
The Dreams of Harriet Tubman mural project, and specifically Moses,
the mural sketch originally proposed for the side wall of Associated
Black Charities
.........................
Baltimore Clayworks was chosen to receive an Artist and Communities
grant from the Mid-Atlantic Arts Foundation because the foundation's
selection panel felt that Clayworks' history of involvement in
bringing arts activities into underserved communities, and of
connecting artists with community residents who have had little or
no access to artmaking, embodied the goals of the national Artists
and Communities initiative. Baltimore Clayworks' artistic leadership
chose artist Mike Alewitz from a preselected pool of more than 100
visual artists for three reasons:
Alewitz' painting as represented in 10 slides of previous
work, was of an extraordinary artistic quality
Alewitz has had a highly respected history, internationally,
of interactive mural making with ethnically diverse community
residents including youth, working people and elders who have had
little or no access to the arts
Alewitz' themes of equality and social justice echoed
Clayworks'values as it approaches communities for arts partnerships.
It is important to understand that the discussion that the community
is having about the image of an armed Harriet Tubman is simply a
discussion about a proposed piece of public art, and whether an
historically accurate image of Tubman as a leader of her people
out of the land of bondage (Moses)
should be displayed in light of contemporary public sensitivities
about gun violence. There are no divisions along racial lines;
there are opinions on both sides. The artist has prepared a statement
concerning the mural and its
content. Please request it for in-depth reference. Furthermore,
it is important to understand that there are four more murals
planned for sites in Maryland, and hundreds of at-risk young people
working in paint and clay to create elements to be included in the
murals. The leadership position of Baltimore Clayworks is this:
Baltimore Clayworks stands true to its mission of artist- centeredness
and support; we will not tell any artist what to create or what to
change. We respect, however, the decision of any community organization
or institution to decline partnership
in any project or program we propose. We expect a level of passion
and commitment to positive artist/community involvement from our
partners.
John K. Smith, Chairman, Board of Trustees Deborah Bedwell, Executive
Director
_______________________________________________
8. Statement by Mike Alewitz
For Immediate Release:
The following statement was issued on June 14, 2000, by Mike Alewitz,
muralist and creator of "The Dreams of Harriet Tubman."
"Harriet Tubman was a fierce opponent of slavery in all it's forms.
She was
opposed by the southern slave-master and northern industrialist
alike. She was an organizer, educator, leader of the abolitionist
movement, feminist, conductor on the underground railroad and armed
insurrectionist against slavery.
Then, as now, Harriet was feared not because she carried a gun,
but because she organized a mass, militant and uncompromising
struggle for social justice.
There are those who would like to transform Harriet Tubman into a
safe and acceptable icon for corporate America. They wish to disarm
her both physically and politically. I will not help them. I will
not disarm Harriet Tubman.
Harriet Tubman does not belong to any individual or group. She is
a figure of international stature. She belongs to working people
throughout the world. Harriet Tubman's life, the war to end slavery,
and the continuation of that struggle today, deserves to be portrayed
in murals, poems and songs by many artists.
The spirit of Harriet Tubman lives on today, with the students
protesting the World Trade Organizations economic policies, in the
prison cell of Mumia
Abu Jamal and other victims of racist injustice, in the strikes
and struggles of working people.
We intend to go forward and put Harriet Tubman on the walls of
Maryland. We
intend to continue to educate and inform about her life, not as a
matter of historical record, but because she is an inspiring example
for working people today.
We appeal to the people of Maryland to provide us with the walls
to do this."
Mike Alewitz is the Artistic Director of the Labor Art & Mural
Project (LAMP). He is Asst. Professor of Art at Central Connecticut
State University, and the author, with Paul Buhle, of the forthcoming
book: "Insurgent Images: the Agitprop Murals of Mike Alewitz,"
Monthly Review Press, NY.
________________________________________
Mike Alewitz, Artistic Director
LaBOR aRT & MuRAL PRoJECT
c/o Department of Art
Central Connecticut State University
New Britain, CT 06050
Phone: (860)832-2359
________________________________________
Website: http://www.igc.apc.org/laborart
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