† Criminal InJustice is a weekly series devoted to taking action against inequities in the U.S. criminal justice system. Nancy A. Heitzeg, Professor of Sociology and Race/Ethnicity, is the Editor of CI. Criminal Injustice is published every Wednesday at 6 pm.

                  Crimes of Style ~ Jean-Michel Basquiat
by nancy a heitzeg

“Most Young Kings Get Their Heads Cut Off…”
― Jean-Michel Basquiat, (December 22, 1960 – August 12, 1988)

There are 20 trillion pieces of text, 30 trillion more numbers to be deployed in the illumination of criminal injustice. And so, every week we do.

Sometimes, however, it is simply best to let the artists have their say- with brushes, with paint, with exploding imagery. To let them distill that universe of trouble onto the canvass.

Just bring it, as Basquiat himself would say,

” Boom! For real.”

(more…)

Diversity of Voice: Views on Guns in the United States

The Warhol: Resources and Lessons

From the guardian:

Warhol’s radical idea that the stuff of modern life could be art, from Campbell’s soup cans to washing-powder boxes, galvanised the art world in the 60s. “I went to see his 1989 retrospective at Moma,” remembers cultural historian Jon Savage. “You walked into the 60s rooms and there it all was – America. Money, sex, fame, death. Warhol summed, up, defined and in many ways embodied the world in which we now live. Everyone thinks he’s emotionless and soulless, but the cumulative effect of seeing all the Marilyns and Orange Disasters is extremely powerful – it’s not just a mirror,” he says…