By ABBY BRAVO
Editor-In-Chief
Since the start of February, campus has been filled with events and displays honoring Black History Month. The Offices of Community Service and Spiritual Life added to the festivities with a multi-part event, Celebrating Black Joy.
Black History Month has been observed for 53 years and is a way to highlight the struggles and celebrate the accomplishments of the Black community.
Niamaya Canady, assistant director of community service, and Joan Horgan, director of spiritual life, sat down to decide what they wanted out of an event to celebrate Black History Month but were having trouble. “We were struggling because it feels like so often that the focus is on the hardships of the past,” said Horgan.
She said they wanted to honor hardships but also wanted to put a spotlight on all of the good that can sometimes get overlooked.
“We came up with a way of honoring different forms of art and the people of color who have been stellar within those art forms, but also using it as a chance to encourage students to make their own art,” said Horgan.
The two noted struggling to narrow down topics to just one event, and their solution was to spread multiple events throughout the month. With three events total, they focus on different aspects of how Black artists influenced different aspects of art and other forms of creativity.
“We wanted it to be more than one day… there were so many awesome things that we could do so we wanted to break it down into different themes,” said Canady.
The first part of the event was held in the Esther Massry Gallery on Feb. 8 from 2 to 4 p.m. and focused on Black art and music. Students were able to sit down and create artwork inspired by Black artists while listening to music created by Black musicians.
Canady wanted the gallery to be a safe and flexible place for students to come. “We just have the space for people to come and go as they please… play in the space,” she said.
“It’s really cool to see representation and I’m really happy to see that there’s more people of color being represented,” said music industry student Penny Sierra. “It’s also really nice to see them utilizing this space because I really love the Gallery,” she added.
There were multiple art mediums presented to students including collages, watercolor, mandalas, and sketch paper. Students were also encouraged to take quotes from prominent Black artists and musicians that resonated with them that were hanging on the wall in the gallery.
Canady describes the space as an “interactive living gallery” where students can leave their art hanging in the space and are able to contribute in any way that they are inspired to.
“It’s great to highlight the things we have overcome but it’s also nice to have just a moment of joy,” said Canady.
The next event, scheduled for Feb. 17 from 5 to 7:30 p.m., will focus on movement and dance where students will be able to move freely in the space. There will be performances by student dance groups Sabor Latino and Alana Steppers as well as a double-dutch contest.
The concluding event, being held on Feb. 28 from 4:30 to 6 p.m., will focus on spoken word and poetry to close out the month on a mellow note.
