A School Mural Was Supposed to Celebrate Black Lives. Instead, It Was Destroyed.
The New York Times
Artwork intended to reflect on social justice and racial equity has exposed long-simmering tensions in a Brooklyn public school.
The mural, showing a rising sun and two children of color wearing crowns, was intended to promote racial equity at a school building in Park Slope, Brooklyn.
Fifth-graders from P.S. 295 spent months designing the artwork, which was spread across the cafeteria wall that their school shares with M.S. 443, a middle school, with the help of Groundswell, a longtime community arts organization.
As the project came together in July, the elementary school principal, Lisa Pagano, became uncomfortable with the slogans that had been added — “Black Lives Matter” and “Black Trans Lives Matter” — as well as a quote by the Black gay feminist writer Audre Lorde, which read, “Your Silence Will Not Protect You.”
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