As a way to highlight the importance of civic engagement and encourage Americans to vote in the upcoming U.S. general election, Facebook has commissioned five artists from across the country on a series of temporary public murals inspired by the idea that “voting is voice.” With this theme, the artists were invited to consider voting as a powerful tool of personal and collective voice.
Each mural design was installed throughout The Bronx, along with nine other cities, including San Diego, Los Angeles, Colorado Springs, Fort Worth, Birmingham, Atlanta, Miami, Philadeqlphia & Detroit for a total of fifty murals in place by the start of National Voter Education Week on October 05, 2020. The murals will feature QR codes and a URL that direct viewers to Facebook’s Voter Information Center and to Instagram.
The participating artists (bios below) represent diverse backgrounds and identities — and their original artwork was designed to reflect their respective communities. Their murals highlight the importance of a multiplicity of voices in a healthy society, the power of personal narratives as vehicles for change, and our collective responsibility to acknowledge and amplify a wide spectrum of experience and perspectives.
Artist Bios
Ramzy Masri, (b. 1988), lives and works in New York, NY @space.ram
- Ramzy Masri is a graphic designer, photographer and artist whose work celebrates the power and joy of being true to your authentic self. Ramzy invites viewers to reimagine the world as a colorful, magical queer-normative space where you can connect with your inner child and discover a more vibrant tomorrow.
- Mural Location: 621 E. 187th Street, Bronx, NY 10458
Edie Fake, b. 1980, lives and works in Twentynine Palms, CA @ediefake
- Edie Fake is a multimedia artist and transgender activist whose work addresses themes of gender, sexuality, and queer identity in the form of zines, prints, comics, drawings, tattoos, paintings, installations, and performances. This mural reflects Fake’s interest in depicting “ecstatic queer architectures” in the context of our rapidly changing social and political climate
- Mural Location: 2344 Arthur Avenue, Bronx, NY 10458
Jamilla Okubo, (b. 1993), lives and works in Washington, DC @jamillaokubo
- Jamilla Okubo’s work draws on her American/Kenyan/Trinidadian identity and incorporates both ancestral and contemporary cultural wisdom. Combining elements of figurative painting, pattern and textile design, fashion, and storytelling, Jamilla celebrates the Black body in relation to movement, expression, ideology, and culture, and invites viewers to find a reflection of themselves in the context of community.
- Mural Location: 2410 Arthur Avenue, Bronx, NY 10458
Tiff Massey, (b. 1982), lives and works in Detroit, MI // @tiff_massey
- Tiff Massey is an interdisciplinary artist whose work is inspired by African standards of economic vitality and informed by her own experiences living in an industrial urban center in flux. Her artistic practice is influenced by the iconic material culture of 1980s hip-hop and explores contemporary class and race dynamics through the lens of the African Diaspora.
- Mural Location: 743 E. 187th Street, Bronx, NY 10458
Troy Lamarr Chew II, (b. 1992), lives and works in California // @troylamarrchew
- Troy Lamarr Chew II uses painting to weave together narratives of contemporary Black culture and indigenous African visuals. The references to West African textiles and hip-hop culture in his work aim to reconnect African Americans with their African heritage after its intentional erasure through the legacy of American slavery and Jim Crow.
- Mural Location: 743 E 187th Street, Bronx, NY 10458
Special thanks to the location partners Bronx Beer Hall & From the Bronx.
