Last spring a doctor (Kara Durand) who is also a parent at a school I’ve done some work at in Oakland reached out to commission me to do an illustrated poster for the Afya Center for Health Equity at Kaiser Permanente Oakland. Afya means health in Swahili.
The center was founded by Dr Nailah Thompson. Listen to her talk about why the clinic was founded and how they are aiming to care for and uplift the health of the East Bay’s Black commmuity.
Here are some photos from when the clinic opened taken by Dr Rita Ng.
And here’s a little bit of artwork to show how the piece was created. For this piece I wanted to illustrate a primary care physician having a conversation with a patient. Something simple but intimate and caring.
Back in March, designer Jules Cowan, fellow illustrator Micah Bizant, myself, and the East Bay Sanctuary Covenant got together to collaborate on this poster illustrating information about immigrant rights when being stopped or approached by ICE. The EBSC has been supporting immigrant and migrant families for decades in the Bay Area. Nuff respect. The raids have happened in the past (under Obama and Trump) but they were just ramping up again to what we see now in LA, Chicago, Central California, and other cities.
Art by Me, Lettering by Jules Cowan
If you keep up with me you should know my position on this is FUCK ICE and FUCK Donald Trump. Actually, fuck any politician Democrat or Republican who continues to lie or hide when talking about the real reasons for these racist, xenophobic, coward ass attacks on Brown people. Mexicanos, Central Americans, Haitians, etc are not the reason White Americans are losing $ or jobs. The billionaire class are the reason and these politicians and mainstream media are being paid to confuse folks.
Art by Micah Bizant, design by Jules Cowan
Now, if you reader would like one of these posters or postcards in English or Spanish, please download them here:
If you’d like a physical copy of a poster or postcard (English or Spanish) for your school, library, office, organization, etc please email me at info@robdontstop.com or art@somossantuario.org.
Thankfully, the folks at EBSC have already handed these out to folks on the ground protesting, but we need information like this up in more places so allies and immigrant families can access it and put it to work. No one is illegal on stolen land!
I started working with CLES –the Coalition for a Liberated Ethnic Studies in 2022 and it has been awesome to contribute to the incredible work they are doing to provide resources, curriculum, and advocacy for folks trying to get ethnic studies to kids in public schools, amplify those currently teaching it, and to stand up for those facing attacks because………surprise surprise, lots of reactionary adults are scared of their children feeling uncomfortable. Yeah, the true history of the United States and how it realtes to the world is uncomfortable af, but as a great writer once said :
"Not everything that is faced can be changed; but nothing can be changed until it is faced." - James Baldwin
Please follow them on IG and cop some merch, to support their work. If you follow me you know how I feel about ethnic studies curriciulum and why it is vital for young people to get and understand.
Dig this? Check out this painting of a phrase I like to use “Ethnic Studies in Every School”.
This is a recent project I forgot to post about last year. Its a mini zine I did some illustrations for. The title of the zine and project is “Earth Seed” led by my comrades over at PKC –The Peoples Kitchen Collectivebased out of Oakland California. “Earth Seed” comes from the incredible Parable Book series by Octavia Butler and is a recent project by PKC.
I first came across the founders of PKC (Jocelyn Jackson, Sita Kuratomi Bhaumik, and Saqib Keval) as a crew at Oakland’s Life is Living Festival. Here’s a video so you can get the vibe for that event because this is also where this mini zine was given out as a way to talk about self suficiency, mutual aid, organizing, creativity, and more.
See PKC at the 1:55 min mark.
Here are some of the images from this zine collaboration with PKC which I am so honored to create. I’m a big fan of Butler and a huge fan of PKC so for this project designed by the talented Kamakshi Duvvuru I wanted to try a very loose style. And because it needed to be produced in black and white I wanted to keep it super simple. This one of the flowers is my favorite.
EARTH SEED INVITES US TO ENVISION AND ENACT OUR COLLECTIVE FUTURE FROM A WORLD AWAKENING TO ITS UNRAVELING.
Led by People’s Kitchen Collective, EARTH SEED centers a pilgrimage through California from present-day Los Angeles to Mendocino Woodlands that happened from March – June 2023. We visited with people and places building models for survival and our collective future.
Rooted in Octavia Butler’s Parables series, the legacy of the Black Panther Party for Self Defense, and the diaspora of the global south, EARTH SEEDenacts radical hospitality as a survival practice. It does so by deepening our relationships with BIPOC activists, artists, educators, farmers, youth, and elders.
Want more info about EarthSeed? You can learn more from PKC’s website here.
Hey these are some cool new stickers I made for an organization called Convergence. They’re a digital and print magazine who makes articles, videos, podcasts, and more around organizing and political issues. Here’s their official description:
“Convergence is a magazine for radical insights. We produce articles, videos, and podcasts to sharpen our collective practice, lift up stories about organizing, and engage in strategic debate — all with the goal of winning multi-racial democracy and a radically democratic economy.”
I did a whole bunch of different sketches and ideas with phrases that Convergence wanted to see and these are the phrases they wanted to see.
From there I did a bunch of color ideas using a limited color palette and I was really happy they let me run with that.
These are the final color pieces and….
And this is what the final stickers looked like. I really loved working on this with Convergence and love how they came out. I have been making stickers and merch for myself for awhile now and this is only the second time Ive been hired to do it for someone else which was fun!! I’m not sure if you can buy these individually but I know the org was using them as part of one of their fundraising efforts. Go to Convergence.com to find out more about their work. (I did not design The Convergence logo).
This is a fun project. Nkeiruka Oruche is the guest editor for this issue of “In Dance Magazine” and she invited me to write and illustrate a short personal experience relating to dance. When she asked me to participate my first thought was that I’m not a dancer but she wanted a mix of folks. Those whose creative practice it is to dance and those who’ve danced at some point in life, which I think is most of us. Anyway, check out my illustration from the piece.
Here’s my sketch, painting of dancers, and added background and text.
I had fun doing this and I’m thankful to writer, dancer, editor, multi-disciplinary artist Nkei for inviting me:). The magazine features a variety of folks from the Bay and nationally, regular folks and dancers of course with some interesting stories about family, tradition, culture, institutions, and lots of opportunities to move your body. Check it out!!!!!
This past fall I did some quick drawings for Oakland’s “Chapter 510” who are always doing work around empowering young writers, readers, and thinkers. These are a few of the portraits of some young people for their collective poem called “A Sense of Belonging”. More info about the project here.
Dig this? Check out this portrait I did of Leila for Chapter 510 and Oakland Public Library.
This is a sketch for a portrait of graffiti artist Spie
Sup with it fam, its been awhile since I shared some sketches from my process. I share process art a lot with different projects but sometimes I just love looking back at the sketches I made before painting some of my personal or client work. Sometimes the sketches are better than the final. Something about the energy in them.
This was for East Oakland’s “Street Level Health”
Chapter 510 (organization) sketch
Sketch from the book Sam! Published by Penny Candy Books
Curry sketch – Warriors
Wide sketch for “Asian Art Museum” in SF
For BLK History month 2021 – Little Richard
This is a sketch for “Orange Barrel Media” AD in Ohio
Here’s a self portrait I did many years ago
Sketch Postcard for “Sunrise Movement”
Sketch for Zumbi (Zion-I) RIP
Here’s a sketch from “Alejandria Fights Back” pub by Feminist press
Thanks for checking out the sketches. If you notice the majority of my sketches are on paper with pencil. In the last few years I have been using an I-pad pro increasingly to speed up the sketch process and move things around, so you’ll be seeing more of those sketches. If you dig these check out my sketchbook tour
I have been working w/ the ACLU since 2016 and always enjoy the process and work that gets produced especially when it aids in telling the story of regular people fighting for human and civil rights. Case in point, the art for this report supports the stories of three people who migrated to the US to find work. Erika, Nestor, and Nelson.
While asylum is a term that allows immigrants from any country to migrate to another for political and/or safety reasons the folks targeted and deported consistently in the United States are Black and Brown people. This is not hearsay but fact. See the Chinese exclusion act, the Bracero program, the treatment of Mexican and Central Americans vs the red carpet for Cuban exiles or immigrants from Europe.
This study is a collaboration w/ California Rural Legal Assistance foundation and it looks at Central California specifically and interrogates how the Sheriff’s in the region collude with ICE (Immigration and Customs Enforcements) to deport Latinxs.
This is cool for two reasons. First it is an organization dedicated to uplifting positive images of Black folks using multimedia including kids books. And two, I got to collaborate with designer Cheyanne Rhodes and founder of B is For black Brilliance Shawna Wells. Some of my artwork is in this video! Ok, please follow them on IG, check out their store, and follow along as they share Blk folks for “Black Brilliance Month”. Shout to Amy Sonnie for the connect!
