Artists and activists seek to honor Tamir Rices legacy through cultural center, restoration of gazebo – cleveland.com

CLEVELAND, Ohio Hundreds gathered at the Cleveland Museum of Art on Wednesday to transform five years worth of anger and sorrow over the death of Tamir Rice at the hands of Cleveland police into feelings of love and support for his mother, Samaria Rice.

The three-hour event, Art, Activism and the Legacy of Tamir Rice, highlighted how the killing of a 12-year-old boy carrying a pellet gun outside the Cudell Recreation Center impacted the lives of people in the community and across the world. The event was emceed by Black Lives Matter co-founder Opal Tometi.

In his invocation, Rev. Jawanza Colvin of the Olivet Institutional Baptist Church spoke to a key theme of the evening: a mothers love.

A love that raises a child and dreams of his adventures as a man, but having little idea she wasnt raising a man, she was raising a martyr, Colvin said of Samaria Rice. May her strength become ours and may her passion become our North Star.

Rice and other Mothers of the Movement were seated at the front of the museums Gartner Auditorium, and were a prominent presence in the room. It is the grieving mothers and family members to whom activists and community members defer regarding how to proceed in the face of injustice, according to organizer and artist Amanda King.

A grand jury already declined to bring charges against either police officer involved in the shooting. The prosecutor who recommended the grand jury not return indictments has been voted out of office. For those seeking justice for Tamir, there are no more obvious demands from the system. So they turn to Samaria Rice.

It was Rice who, in 2016, contacted Chicago-based artist Theaster Gates and asked for help in finding a new home for the gazebo near where Tamir was shot on Nov. 22, 2014. Some may remember the video of the shooting in which Tamir is seen standing in front of the gazebo as Officer Frank Garmback pulls up in a cruiser and Officer Timothy Loehmann shoots Tamir in less than two seconds.

Gates on Wednesday said he took up the charge to bring the disassembled gazebo to Chicago and rebuild it at the Stony Island Arts Bank. But it didnt get constructed for more than a year.

We had it unbuilt, kind of like half-mast, Gates said. Not wanting to resurrect it for use, but to let the public know that there was this unresolved thing in our midst. And that the object unresolved was similar to a political situation unresolved, a social situation unresolved, a death under-resolved.

Gates, whose work is influenced by his educational background in urban planning and religious studies, compared the reconstruction of the gazebo, and the revitalization of abandoned properties, to biblical resurrections that made people believe.

There are moments when its important that we shine a light on the objects that matter to us, Gates said in an interview with journalist and activist Bakari Kitwana.

When the gazebo comes back to Cleveland at an undetermined date, Gates said he hopes it commemorates Tamirs legacy and serves as a reminder of the system that failed him.

[The gazebo] is a material way of demonstrating Tamirs life, but also, theres something about the resurrection of this object that keeps us believing in the possibility of a regenerative hope of a political process that works, of equity that allows people to be safe, knowing that their children are safe in their neighborhood, Gates said.

Safety was another theme of the event. Artist Michael Rakovitz spoke about his exhibit, A Color Removed, that was inspired by the orange safety tip that had been removed from Tamirs pellet gun, and is often cited as part of the reason why police immediately shot him.

This focus and this blame, that the removal of the orange tip leading to the removal of this person of color, was outrageous, Rakovitz said.

The gallery included orange objects from across Cleveland as well as a video about Aboud Shadi, a 13-year-old Palestinian boy killed by an Israeli sniper in 2015. The video was donated by the Al-Aida refugee camp in Bethlehem where Aboud lived.

And where I visited, only to learn there was also a memorial to Tamir in the refugee camps playground because they immediately saw the connection between Abouds and Tamirs stories, Rakovitz said.

Samaria Rice and architect Sandra Madison said safety will be a cornerstone of the Tamir Rice Afrocentric Cultural Center. The two unveiled floor plans and renderings for the two-story, 99-year-old building at 6117 St. Clair Ave. in Clevelands St. Clair-Superior neighborhood.

Tamir loved the arts, Rice said. His favorite was music.

Thats why the front room of the center will be the music room, accompanied by a dance studio, art studio, stage and classroom for tutoring and lessons on civics and Pan-Africanism, Rice said. Renderings reflect plans to transform the drab interior into vibrant spaces, bursting with colors, the most prominent of which is orange.

The Tamir Rice Foundation hopes to raise $20,000 for the cultural center.

Several artists on Wednesday were inspired by Samaria Rice and other mothers whose children have been killed. Both photographer Sheila Pree Bright and dancer Lexy Lattimore likened Rice to the mother of Emmett Till, a 14-year-old boy who was lynched in Mississippi in 1955.

Lattimore, before her dance, showed a series of images of Till and his parents, and juxtaposed them with pictures of Tamir and Samaria Rice. As the photo of Emmett turned into a photo of Tamir their similar soft smiles and bright eyes their deaths, 59 years apart, seemed to exist in the same moment.

Tamirs death was also compared to another from 50 years ago in that of 21-year-old Fred Hampton Sr., chairman of the Black Panther Party in Chicago. To the audiences surprise, Fred Hampton Jr., an unbilled speaker, took to the stage to discuss his fathers legacy and how law enforcement continues to terrorize communities.

Other artists included poet Kisha Nicole Foster, musician Jasiri X, and E.J. Hill, who installed The University of St. Tamir at Harvard University.

Filmmakers Korstiaan Vandiver and Danielle Lee discussed their film 12, which chronicles the last day of Tamirs life and his mothers fight for justice.

It takes a village to raise a child, Vandiver said. It takes a village to destroy one. And it takes a village it make it right.

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Artists and activists seek to honor Tamir Rices legacy through cultural center, restoration of gazebo - cleveland.com