Artistic Activism Quotes

During the Vietnam War, which lasted longer than any war we've ever been in - and which we lost - every respectable artist in this country was against the war. It was like a laser beam. We were all aimed in the same direction. The power of this weapon turns out to be that of a custard pie dropped from a stepladder six feet high.

Art and activism can be symbiotic. They don't have to be, of course; they can also be contradictory.

Art is not something to decorate a wall. Art is a political weapon.

All art is propaganda, and ever must be, despite the wailing of the purists. I stand in utter shamelessness and say that whatever art I have for writing has been used always for propaganda for gaining the right of black folk to love and enjoy. I do not care a damn for any art that is not used for propaganda.

In this new world where art is willfully misinterpreted to score points and to distract, simply doing the work of an artist has become a political act.

Art has to change things, and if it was immediately acceptable it would not be doing the job.

The artist as citizen is here to stay.

I think if you're going to make political art, you have to engage at some level. You can't just write about politics, you have to try and be politics as well.

I think it's our responsibility as artists to not only fight for our art but fight for the communities that are the reason we're able to continue making art, especially since, in Brooklyn's case, we as artists somehow made it 'cool' enough for the bigger money-making industries to start taking over.

We use celebrity to the advantage of everything. Why not to the advantage of those who need to be liberated? My job was to convince the icons in the arts that they needed to have a presence in Washington on that day.

As an artist I come to sing, but as a citizen, I will always speak for peace, and no one can silence me in this.

Paul Robeson once said that the artist has the responsibility to either help liberate the community or further oppress it. And I think that when Eldridge Cleaver wrote it down it was interpreted as his, but there's a history of people saying things of that nature and meaning it. And what I do is in that tradition, in that mode.

Sometimes art is ahead of revolution.

I think art is a very important weapon to achieve human freedom

My role as an artist is not to make changes [in society] but to inspire changes.

Theater has an incredible capacity to move people to social change, to address issues, to inspire social revolution.

Rock-and-roll was an example of change in the body of the culture. I think it's really what helped bring the anti-war movement to its peak and moved people into the streets to seize the day - the movement was the embodiment of what was happening in the music. This is what taught me that it was possible to bring art and activism together. Without that piece, that energetic embodiment piece, the rest is just intellectual construct.

Art is an instrument in the war against the enemy.

I love being part of a project that imparts a positive message, is somehow educational or enlightening, helps to bridge differences, or inspires viewers in some way. I believe a lot of artists become activists because we rely on and value the freedom of expression and so we want to protect it.

People like Dick Gregory, Paul Robeson, Harry Belafonte and Nina Simone show me what the definition of an artist is - it isn't just to make art but to speak truth to what's happening, speak beauty into the world, speak love into the world and also... get involved.

Ray Charles' revolutionary approach to music was also reflected in his politics and his deep and abiding commitment to Martin Luther King and the plight of African-Americans. Ray Charles may not have been on the front lines, but he put his money where his mouth was.

So-called leaders aren't doing anything, so it's become the job of artists like me. We have to get on the front lines and fight for the people who have love and tolerance in their hearts and want to live in a unified world.

I'm a sort of political person, and I feel that there's a kind of ineradicably political dimension to theater, to all theater, whether it's overtly political or not.

I think at some point there may be artists who will get fed up, and they deliberately want to use their art as a means to rock the waves a little bit. And instead of doing the status quo, they'll deliberately go out to really make a change. I think Kendrick Lamar is an example of that.

I was waiting for the world to change. I'm no longer waiting; I'm part of that movement. I think our role as performers and entertainers is so much bigger.