Several months ago, I was showing paintings to one of my art dealers. They were from my series, “The Difference Between Me and You” which is about race relations between Haitians and Dominicans. He said: “With you everything is about race.”

He was absolutely right. As an African American man in this country, everything is reduced to race. Whether it’s reporting the news live on television (Omar Jimenez) or watching birds in Central Park (Christian Cooper) or allegedly using counterfeit money at a store (George Floyd). I know that when I navigate in the world, my actions are perceived in a heightened way because of my race. These Black men in recent events showed that even if you are graceful, peaceful and compliant your mere existence is fragile under weaponised racism.

As a young man, I attended the Art Students League of New York. One morning an older white woman accused me of making an inappropriate gesture towards her in the elevator. It was so surreal because I was simply fast-forwarding a song on my Walkman. She got off the elevator but then turned back to interrupt the closing doors to say I was being “fresh” or something. Then she scuttled off. I could not understand how my hand gestures could possibly be taken offensively.

Another time when I attended The School of Visual Arts, I got into a loud argument with one of my white male painting teachers. He constantly yelled with a bunch of insults, but I remember him saying: “Do you think Rembrandt would paint like that?” To me it was goofy, because it was just an intro to painting from life. Later in “Originality”, an art theory class conducted by Adrienne Leban, a fellow student was surprised during student introductions. She was a young white woman who heard about me from the painting teacher. She said: “You seem nice. I thought you would be bigger.”

I’m thankful that Garin Baker suggested I take his painting class. He changed my life by teaching painting from life with compassion. Another time at SVA, I attended painting sessions with some of the top painters in the country. One day I was collecting my canvas from the previous week. The most prominent painter accused me of stealing. I explained that I had been attending the sessions for weeks, but he didn’t believe me. I was so thankful that the late painter Irwin Greenberg vouched for me.

My way of fighting against systemic racism has been to use my art. My protest has been to vandalise the internet with beautiful images of African American people. I’ve painted other races, like my Latina friend and model Janderie Gutierrez and the Russian model Sasha Edelman, because I truly see humanity in everyone. But as an African American man it’s imperative to show the humanity of my people.

With my series “Luxury Graffiti and Avoid a Void”, I began including images of my children. The decision expanded my artistic vision and challenged my skills, but perhaps more importantly, it was a way to show the value of their lives. I’ve been specifically concerned with the lives of my boys Kace and Kent. In a naïve way, I hope that the world will spare their lives if it’s known that they are worthy of being represented in a work of art. Already at the ages of 14, they’ve experienced racism and prejudice on an amplified scale compared to my daughter Adison. She hasn’t been immune to society’s racist gaze, but with my teenage boys, it’s a matter of life and death.

Through a vicious, hypocritical, sociopathic system, America was designed around race. It’s societal, political, religious and financial infrastructure is about race. The very existence of the United States is predicated on the subjugation and murder of the Black man. In America, everything with me is about race.

Tui Motu Magazine. Issue 250 July 2020: 20