It was 2014, on the eve of my hearing of the passing of the legendary luminary Maya Angelou that I penned these words held buoyant by hers, “Bringing the gifts that my ancestors gave, I am the dream and the hope of the slave.” For the last few weeks I’d walked in the challenge of addressing, through art, the theme of violence in Colombia. Colombia was enslaved by a history of violence that continues to taint its present color in the eyes of the rest of the world. In my time there, from speaking on the panel with the mayor of Medellin downtown at the Mayo por la Vida Celebration, to walking the neighborhood streets of rural Apartado with school age children; I saw the power of the very thing that Maya Angelou talked about-hope. Hope, not the one that sits and reaches out to nothing and just waits. No. Hope, that unsinkable mindset that hovered above me night after night as I pondered the depth of the question asked of me many times during my sojourn there, “Do you really believe in world peace?” Each time, the question hit me like a dark wave threatening to drown the belief in change to which I clung ever so tightly.
One evening I had the honor of visiting a three year old girl who had been shot just days before. As I knelt down beside her, without hesitation or concern she reached out and put her tiny arms around my neck and gave me a hug that could have embraced the world. In her sunshine smile and angelic eyes I saw what I needed to see, my answer, the reason I was doing what I was doing. I saw hope in its purest form shining onto my faith and casting away any shadow of doubt that may have been lurking in my mind. Not the type of hope that sits waiting, internally pleading for something to change, but the kind that continually rises up in the face of all that would suppress us. The Spanish word for hope is esperanza. That little crippled girl awakened in me a renewed sense of hope. Esperanza was echoed in the face of every child and Colombian I saw from that point onward. I always reminded myself that there’s always a way.
I am an artist, and art is my weapon of choice for peace and justice. What I mean by justice is that which I want for myself, I also want for others. I bring, like Maya Angelou said, the gifts the ancestors gave and I use them for the enriching of this planet we are blessed to inhabit. Although I was a speaker of English in a Spanish speaking country, art is a universal language, and her most vivid color is love. I was met with the spirit I came with. I walk with art as agency for change. Change is coming. Not only do I believe it, I know it because I saw the preview of a new world reflected in the eyes of the children who looked into mine. And in their smiles and attitudes I saw the blueprints. That isn’t political or scientific, or any other form of measurable statistic. It’s the power of esperanza. Where there is life, esperanza (hope) lives, and where she lives, change is inevitable. Hold on.
Notes of A Native Son 