Remaining positive, hopeful and productive in times far more interesting than anyone could have predicted five years ago is the new task. The stunning lack of leadership at the highest levels makes this increasingly difficult as we face a Constitutional crisis in addition to nation-wide police brutality, racism and the ongoing pandemic. Above: Protesters on West 39th Street yesterday evening; video: Paula Alyce Scully

As we continue to educate ourselves, as individuals and as new graduates, we look to our libraries and bookstores for inspiration and information. Today, Andrew Durbin, Editor of Frieze magazine, reiterated an antiracism reading list collected by Ibram X. Kendi and published in the New York Times in 1919. It includes classics by Langston Hughes, Zora Neale Hurston and Malcolm X, as well as new sociological and historical works by Glory Edim, James Forman Jr. and Jonathan M. Metzl. Kendi recently sat down for Vox’s podcast Today, Explained, says Durbin, to discuss ‘America’s living nightmare’. 

Right: An excerpt from Tom Genower’s contribution to Rescue Party, from Desert Island Comics

Tonight from 6 to 7:30 pm, reports Hyperallergic, the Brooklyn Movement Center, a Black-led community organizing group based in Bedford-Stuyvesant, is leading a teach-in on defunding the NYPD and repealing 50-A, a New York State statute that shields police from necessary oversight as it pertains to misconduct. 

Verso Books is likewise offering free access to ebook copies of Vitale’s illuminating text The End of Policing, which advocates for a “systematic questioning of the specific roles that police currently undertake” and attempts to develop evidence-based alternatives. Verso is also offering free ebook downloads of David Correia and Tyler Wall’s Police, A Field Guide, an illustrated handbook that is meant to serve as a “survival manual for encounters with cops and police logic.”

Additionally, the digital art and culture platform Rhizome has published “Digital Resources for a Movement Against Police Violence,” a guide which includes strategies, readings, security app recommendations, and other resources.

See Brooklyn Movement Center’s event page for more details.

The Walker Art Center announced today that it would no longer contract with the Minneapolis Police Department to handle security for special events until “implements meaningful change,” including “demilitarizing training programs, holding officers accountable for the use of excessive force, and treating communities of color with dignity and respect,”  according to The Art Newspaper. “Enough is enough. George Floyd should still be alive. Black lives matter.”

On the brighter side of the future, Rockefeller Center has announced an open call for submissions to The Flag Project. It reads, “To honor the city that built us, we’re getting creative – by inviting you to a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to design the iconic flags at Rockefeller Center. This summer, we will raise your artwork on the 192 flagpoles surrounding the rink to celebrate New York’s diverse culture, vibrant energy and strength. The prompt is simple: Show your love for New York.

Chosen flags will fly high alongside designs by Carmen Herrera, Christian Siriano, Faith Ringgold, Hank Willis Thomas, Jeff Koons, Jenny Holzer, KAWS, Laurie Anderson, Marina Abramovic, Sarah Sze, Shantell Martin and Steve Powers. 

Your flag design can take as many styles as the city itself—it can be a visual love letter, drawing or collage, or a showpiece of graphic design. Collaborate with your family at home, virtually with a friend, neighbor, grandparent, or fly solo. However you decide to express your love, be creative and have fun!The deadline is June 30th; submit your artwork Yhere. Sign up to The Rock List for updates and information on when the selected flags will be raised.

forcegallery_ is a virtual gallery created in response to the global pandemic. The inaugural opening of “Group Solitude" brings the @ny_studioschool community together to ask the question: How can art reflect this moment of isolation?

Left: Eva Jiménez-Cerdanya, Looking for Courbet, 2020. The artist says, "Since NYC went into quarantine I discovered the bathroom is the only space in my living quarters I desire to celebrate, for many reasons. Despite it narrowness, here I encounter some forces of the open outdoors, currents, temperatures that I so miss now."

This drawing is part of @forcegallery_ first show, Group Solitude- with works of many artists who have lost access to their studio during the pandemic.” Participating artists are: Bee Chessman, Halle Dillon, Nina Kardon Baran, Ron Berg, Molly Must, Erin Davies Miller, Alexis Nunnelly, Jamie Allen, Eva Jiménez, Bailey Gardner, Alison Causer, Rachael Bohlander, Francine Fanali, Erica Newton, Michael Reyes, Hagar Fletcher, Katherine Fichthorn, Paula Sefer, Chris Thixton, Jack Albrittain, Helen Kohnke, Lauren Reynolds. On June 11 there will be a virtual artist talk on Zoom from 6 to 7:30 pm; register here.

Desert Island Comics, the downtown Brooklyn mecca for comics and graphic novels, has created an Instagram project that celebrates the world beyond our current reality. Reported by Eliza Levinson in Hyperallergic today, Rescue Party “offers a rare bastion of hope amid otherwise depressing social media timelines." 

Launched in April, Rescue Party offered Desert Island’s followers an exercise:  draw a nine-panel comic that explores an “ideal future” or imagines a post-pandemic utopia. Artists were only given a few visual guidelines, but the main point was to “stay positive.” See for your self: