Faith Ringgold Artwork

Freed From Rikers Prison

ARTIST FAITH RINGGOLD traveled to the massive Rikers Island jail complex in New York City, in 2019, so that she could see how her first 1972 public art commissioned mural, “For the Women’s House,” was faring.  Not so good, she decided, and the 92 year old artist continued to quietly wage her campaign to see her work — which hung in a forlorn hallway behind Plexiglas seen only by a few — displayed at the Brooklyn Museum with Ringgold's other artworks, aside from many more multi-genre creations seen across and beyond America. Her renown artistic and activist traits remain.

THE VISUAL HEALING purpose of the mural had been lost or ignored by officials at many levels. The mural's truest purpose was to foster peace, potential and perspective for the women inmates, despite the prison's hellish conditions.

ONLY JUST THIS YEAR, New York City's Public Design Commission agreed to a long-term loan of the vibrant contemporary artwork from the Department of Correction to the museum. It followed a request by Mayor Bill de Blasio, in his two-term mayoralty's last days, that the 50-year old mural be lent to the city's third largest cultural institution.

IN TERMS OF ACTIONS, beyond words, the negligence showed that the Commission still has a long way to go in authentically protecting artists and their art — two essential elements in the city's culture and economy.  Berlin, Paris and London are decades ahead on the laws and action of major public funding for culture and its creators. DM      VIDEO►      VIDEO►      VIDEO►      VIDEO►

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