HANK WILLIS THOMAS is a conceptual artist who works primarily with themes related to perspective, identity, commodity, media, and popular culture. His work has been exhibited globally. Select collaborative projects include Question Bridge: Black Males and For Freedoms. Thomas’s public art practice includes permanent artworks around the country, including The Embrace (2023) in Boston. Thomas holds a B.F.A. from New York University, New York, NY (1998) and an M.A./M.F.A. from the CCA, San Francisco, CA (2004). He received honorary doctorates from the Maryland Institute of Art, Baltimore, and the Institute for Doctoral Studies in the Visual Arts, Portland, ME, in 2017. Thomas was the 2022 U.S. Department of State Medal of Arts honoree from the Office of Art in Embassies, Washington, DC.
THE GUN VIOLENCE MEMORIAL PROJECT PANEL DISCUSSION
The Gun Violence Memorial Project Panel Discussion
Image credit: Info goes here…
Saturday, May 3, 1-2PM
MOCAD CAFÉ
ADMISSION: Free and open to the public.
Join MOCAD for a panel discussion on the Detroit edition of The Gun Violence Memorial Project.
FEATURED PANELISTS
- Hank Willis Thomas – Songha & Company founder + Creative Director
- Jha D Amazi – MASS Design Group Architect
- Alia Harvey-Quinn – founder of FORCE Detroit
- Jova Lynne – Moderator, Artistic Director and Co-Director of MOCAD
The exhibition is a collaborative initiative illuminating the gun violence epidemic in America and honoring lives lost to gun violence. Panelists will explore the project’s role in collective memory, healing, and activism, discuss firearm injury prevention strategies, and reflect on how art can amplify community voices, foster healing, and inspire action against gun violence.
About Our Speakers
Image: Artist Hank Willis Thomas. Courtesy of Songha & Company.
JHA D AMAZI believes that the narratives upheld in our public realm should be expanded to represent, honor, and celebrate the experiences, histories, and cultures of people who have been historically denied representation in our memorial landscape. As a Principal at MASS Design Group, Jha D leads the Public Memory and Memorials Lab, engaging communities to design projects such as the Franklin Park Action Plan, the Emmett Till & Mamie Till-Mobley National Monument Project, the Gun Violence Memorial Project, and the Sugar Land 95 Cemetery Revitalization Project. Beyond her contributions at MASS, Jha D is a spoken word artist, event producer, and SpaceMaker for the LGBTQ+ communities of color. In 2023, she was appointed to the Governor’s Advisory Council on Black Empowerment by Massachusetts Governor Maura Healey. Jha D graduated with honors from Northeastern University (B.S. Arch) and the University of Pennsylvania (M. Arch I).
Image: Jha D Amazi
ALIA HARVEY-QUINN is a bold leader with a dedication for investing in often-ignored, emerging grassroots leaders. As the daughter of Black Panthers, Alia’s calling into the world of activism, leadership, and community-building was always in her DNA, but was emboldened by organizing with youth who were dealing with issues of criminalization and violence. Alia is the founder and Executive Director of FORCE Detroit. Under her leadership, Force Detroit has established itself as a widely-recognized and well-respected community organization, shedding light locally and nationwide on the solutions to gun violence, primarily focusing on Community Violence Intervention (CVI). Force Detroit led advocacy for CVI adoption throughout the state of Michigan and led the team that drove the reduction in violence in Detroit’s Cody Rouge neighborhood between July 2023 – June 2024.
Her inventive leadership significantly shaped Detroit’s strategy within the White House Community Violence Intervention Initiative. She has also influenced philanthropic giving in Detroit, resulting in more than a million dollars of investment being redistributed to over 45 grassroots organizations in Detroit. Before founding FORCE Detroit, Alia was the Detroit Director of Michigan Faith in Action. In this role, she organized a table composed of justice-impacted leaders, safety activists, radical clergy, and Muslim women committed to advocating for issues of safety and justice. This table attracted the investment of the Ford Foundation, the Faith in Action National Network, and became the foundation for the work of Force Detroit.
Image: Alia Harvey-Quinn
JOVA LYNNE is a practicing artist, curator, and the inaugural Artistic Director of the Museum of Contemporary Art Detroit (MOCAD), co-leading the institution alongside the Chief Operating Officer, Marie Ann Madison-Patton. Lynne first joined the institution in 2017 as a Ford Foundation Curatorial Fellow and in 2019 became the Susanne Feld Hilberry Senior Curator. Prior to MOCAD, Lynne was Director at Temple Contemporary at Philadelphia’s Tyler School of Contemporary Art and Architecture. Lynne worked in the education departments of the Museum of Moving Image in Queens, New York and the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts in San Francisco, California. Lynne graduated from Cranbrook Academy of Arts with her M.F.A. in Photography in 2017. Lynne’s artwork can be found in the collections of Harvard Art Museums in Cambridge, Massachusetts, the Detroit Institute of Art in Michigan, and The Wedge Collection in Toronto, Canada, amongst others.
Image: Jova Lynne
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