Famous Dead

I don't know about you, but for several weeks, my social media news feed was inundated with the "Black Lives, Blue Lives, All Lives" debate and it was exhausting. The talking past and over each other, the comment section devolving, as it often does in open forums. It's like a car crash - I can't help but look.

What it comes down to is a question of empathy. In "Famous Dead" I present an image of what it's like to live with the weight of racism when I let myself really look at it. The trauma of snuff film after snuff film with the subtext - It could have been me or someone in my family; It still could be.

I wasn't raised in the USA. The benefit of being raised in a predominantly black country is that race was not a thing I thought about too deeply, or that I considered on a regular basis. It is something I had to learn to adapt to for my own safety. Even now, when I encounter ignorance, I can't say that race is the always the first thing that springs to mind, but it certainly makes the list.