isleswoman:thechanelmuse:New Orleans Artist, Brandan “BMike” Odums“I’ve been very blessed to be enga

isleswoman:thechanelmuse:New Orleans Artist, Brandan “BMike” Odums“I’ve been very blessed to be engaged in these extremely organic outdoor projects that have been taking place in New Orleans, that led to my current exhibit. One is Project Be. I broke into a housing project, abandoned since Hurricane Katrina, and I went in there and started painting murals to send a message to those people who have to walk by and deal with that space every day, to kind of give them encouragement. So I had no idea that anyone [else] would ever see the work outside of the physical space that it stood, but Instagram had just popped off in New Orleans, so the images began to be shared around and people from all over began to venture out to try and find this work. That got shut down because it was illegal and it was a problem for people to get back into the space to see the work.“That led to another project called Exhibit Be, which was a more legal version of the first one, where this time it was a privately own apartment complex that was abandoned since Katrina, and this time I got permission to the owner to transform the space and create an art exhibits. I reached out to over 35 artists, we transformed a 150-unit complex into this art exhibit. Over 10,000+ people came to the space and it shook up New Orleans to show people the power of the art, how art can heal, can inspire and empower others. Once that got shut down in January 2014, I got introduced to this new space, I pitched my first solo show, it’s inside 35,000 sq. ft. studio and I worked as big as I could do outdoors and took what I learned from that and tried to fully intentionalize how this space could be used to teach, educate and inspire.“At first, I was just painting people I looked up to in history. People like, Chairman Fred Hampton and Nikki Giovanni and then when the kids came through, they had no idea who these people were. It was about introducing these amazing people who helped me unlock my potential to these kids. The other part is to define and showcase the value of the individual.“That’s the legacy I come from. My elders taught me, art for art’s sake is not true. Artists will always, as Paul Robeson said, be the gatekeepers of truth. As Nina Simone says, ‘Art is supposed to reflect the times.’ I come from that tradition. The people who taught me, they instilled that in me to be like, ‘Yo, if you’re gonna have this talent, you have to be conscious about how you use it and how it impacts other people.’ And that’s the type of work that I do.”SourceAlways highlight -- source link
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