 I'm Carmen Ermo and I'm Sarah Softness, Assistant Curator of Special Projects. We are your session hosts for session three. In session three, we're covering a wide range of topics, so from spirituality to sexuality. Here we're hearing from business and philanthropic leaders as well as from women who have galvanized millions. So it is my pleasure to introduce our first conversation. We're bringing together colleagues from the Open Society Foundations. We've generously supported this conference. Google and Cheddar Inc. So with that, please help me welcome Alvin Starks, Rashida Bumbray, William Floyd, and Anjali Kumar. Good afternoon. What an incredible day. I'm super honored and thankful to Bonnie, Tom, and for this invitation. And I'm super honored to be here with my colleagues, Alvin Starks, Anjali Kumar, and William Floyd to talk about this important role of philanthropy and also the private sector in driving social change through culture and art. So I just sort of wanted to bring us into this conversation with the great understanding and I think we all have in this room today and that is that this political moment necessitates us to be responding. It necessitates us to be able to think on our feet and to move aside the layers of bureaucracy that exist in the various fields that we're working in to move us forward in terms of the political reality but also the political and collective imagination. So I wanted to really begin this conversation really with William because I think the great legacy of lynching exhibition, which I'm sure many of you all experience, is a really wonderful example of the way that museums who, you know, those of us that have worked in museums, we know that there can be sort of a dinosaur kind of timeframe that we work under. You know, we're studying for this exhibition for five years and then, you know, we present it to a million people. And finally, when it's time to make the exhibition, you know, it's gone through all of these things but what does it really mean to respond in your curatorial work, in your director work and also in your role at Google to make the things happen that can respond to the political reality of the day? So William, I really wanted to begin with you and sort of talk about what it means to be responsive in your work and how have you been able to really foreground the importance of art in the conversation about not only our political reality but our historical memory and the necessity of actually telling the truth about history so that we can deal in reality but then also begin to imagine the future that we want to live in. Google's work with EJI and the exhibition, the beautiful exhibition, the haunting exhibition that was here most recently at the Brooklyn Museum was actually born out of the company and specifically the employees need and desire to respond to the horrific, racially motivated killings that started two years ago. So in the wake of the Charleston shootings and the shootings of Michael Brown and Eric Garner, Google employees led by the Black Employee Resource Group held a series of awareness campaigns to show solidarity with the movement and that spurred the company and particularly the foundation to figure out how can we support our employees and most importantly, how can we support the communities that are being affected by this through philanthropy. So through our inclusion grants, we created a racial and social justice portfolio where we gave out at least at the time a total of $5 million that's now going to $20 million. Yes, incredibly impactful but we kind of knew just intrinsically that we needed to do more, we wanted to do more and particularly through our philanthropy, we wanted to know how can we really promote the change that we demand, that we all demand and that led us to reaching out to Brian Stevenson initially to advise us like what should we be doing knowing of the great work that he and the Equal Justice Initiative does, we thought he is the best person to help us and he was the one who very smartly said, what you're doing is tactical. What you need to be doing is the strategic work to change the narrative around what's happening because what you're seeing is just a slice. What history shows you is that this is a part of a longer, more horrific structural response to race in this country and that culminated in a very moving speech that Brian gave to Google and as I was saying to Anjali, who's also a former Googler, it was so moving that our founders were like, okay, we need to write him a check right now. So, and that embarked us on an incredibly moving partnership that culminated not only in us just giving him money and supporting Brian's effort to create a memorial museum to the legacy of lynching, but we again, feeling compelled to change that narrative, we thought like what can we do? So, we thought, A, we're a technology company, we're completely out of our depth, but we know technology, what can we do? So, we thought let's underwrite this with data, let's get the information out there about how this legacy starts from lynching to segregation to mass incarceration. Let's help Brian tell that story, but we knew data wasn't the only thing that we could do. For most of the world, we think data's dry and we thought if we wanna change the narrative, we need art, which then gave rise to us creating this exhibition with Brian, which gave rise to a film which is amazing curricula, but again, we knew we needed to do more and that's when we turned to Ann and Sarah, who I really have to battle down because once we launched this initiative, we realized like oh, this really should have a home in art. There needs to be a dialogue with art so that this could be illuminated. Who can we talk to? Who can we do this with? And also, who can do this in like five weeks' time? Because literally, that's the Google way, like can we do this quickly? And I raised this with J.A. Ford and David Berliner who works here and they ran back to Ann and Ann was like, we have to do this. And that culminated in an amazing exhibition on the legacy of lynching that not only spotlights the work that we did with Brian, but put that in dialogue with art so that people could see artists forever have been talking about the racial injustice that unfortunately seems to be a foundational element to our country. Thank you. You know, I think what was most amazing for me is someone that comes from the art world and has been living with the work of Glenn Ligon for many, many years was how these works from the Brooklyn Museum Collection could actually sing in a different way and could speak in a different way. And so even this work from Glenn Ligon that looks at, I always wondered what would happen to all of that beauty, this concept from James Baldwin. I think it was really sort of beautifully contrasted with the reality of this moment of these women walking with the jars, with the names of their loved ones to collect the soil at the base of the tree where he was lynched. And I think that sort of walking in that reality reminds us that so many of us will never have an opportunity to actually be in the place where these atrocities happen and acknowledge that these atrocities happen there, but we all live in that reality. We all live in that sort of collective imaginary space but also political reality of racial trauma. And so I think the way that this shows juxtaposed these very real stories but with these metaphoric artworks, what really spoke to the power of the artworks but also spoke to this idea that Sadia Hartman said of, I live in the time of slavery because I live in the future created by it, so that we're living in the time of lynching right now. And I think that this exhibition really incredibly brought us all into that reality and obviously the work that EJI will do moving forward with the memorialization of the spaces. We'll continue to do that. Thank you. I wanted to also, Anjali, speak to you just really about the role that you've played and it was amazing to me to realize that you've been doing this even at the kitchen, sort of bringing people from various professions and ways of approaching ideas into the necessity of art, right? And so I would love to hear you just talk about not only your role at Google and Cheddar but also your role as a board member for Amplified and the way that you sort of see the necessity of your role in the private sector to drive these conversations. But they're really interested and passionate about art and having this sort of private sector event and where I ended up working a lot in the private sector, a lot in the conflict as well, but where to me art is everything that's all around me. It's what I was raised with so I have a very strong love and appreciation from a lay aide, which may not be... To me art is a compass. It's a moral compass, especially in these dark times where they can speak in ways that words can't where it just provides that guidance. So I think it's just something that is simple that we can all gather around to put in an actual firework. I'm sure. Oh, sorry. I don't know what I'm talking about. Is it fun? Do you mind if I talk? Do you mind if I talk? Do you mind if I talk? Is it good? You can have fun. Mind if I talk? You can just say that. Here they are. Hello. You missed all the brilliant things that just started. I'm going to regroup then. So I was raised by an artist mother. Art to me is very much a moral compass and provides context and guide posts and all the rest of it. And I think it can act that way within institutions too, within companies. And I think having been sort of born and raised within the Google framework of having worked there for a long time, I think what they did was incredibly brave and I think they shouldn't be the only ones doing it. I think all companies in this moment, they need to stand up. They need to be more vocal. They need to be providing that leadership and taking a stand on things. And so to me it's just not, it's non-negotiable. These are not political issues. They are not, they're not really issues up for debate. These are fact-based things. And so we can look at the data, as William said, and say these things happened and these things are not okay and these corporations are in an incredible position with incredible brand microphones and the spaces in communities to be able to house these conversations and to push these things. And I just think it's all of our responsibility. And so I'm not here speaking on behalf of Cheddar. I work for a news organization now and they need to maintain a maximum degree of neutrality and I understand that, but I think as leaders within a corporate community, it's really important that we take a stand that are strong about it. Because I've probably just done a great job. Thank you. And I think one of the other things that is really interesting and I know it was great to hear the presentation about Amplified is like how, because I think working with artists my whole life, all artists hope and imagine that their work would be accessible to the whole world. Obviously they think about a specific audience, but I think this idea of making artworks available to people for a functional purpose is really incredible. And I think it also talks about this idea of how do we respond to this moment? What are the needs? And so I think thinking about the news, I mean obviously how did the news become a controversial sort of idea that it exists to tell us the truth, right? I think even that very premise is now in the dialogue and up for conversation. So I think it puts it on the plane with art, right? Where the maker is bringing a truth, but that truth is meant to be interpreted and that truth that we have to meet it there, right? We have to do the same work that the artist made. So I think sort of bringing people the way that you do from different sectors to this conversation to understand their role is so important. To not be reticent and I think again, people might feel like they can't step into the fray because they have customers on both sides of the aisle or users on both sides of the aisle and that's fine if you don't wanna step into the deep fray but there's plenty of issues out there that are like you said sort of up for debate which just shouldn't be that are fact based so step into those, right? So if Google can take on something like lynching and talk about those racial injustices in such a powerful way that I think the rest of us should be scared to talk about climate change, like that feels like. Right, right, because look, don't get me wrong. We were scared. We went into this entire discussion but once you're there, you realize it and you mentioned it in terms of Rashida, the idea of illuminating the thing that is obscured or highlighting the voice or the narrative or the history that has been shunned is actually kind of a part of our mission. We believe in information, we believe in data, we believe in supporting, having platforms that support everyone's discussion point and when we saw this, we just felt morally compelled. Thank you. I want to move to my colleague Alvin who I had the great pleasure of working with at the Open Society Foundations and in his work and he can speak for himself but I first just wanna say that everyone at Open Society Foundations is so glad that Alvin came back and so he had a sort of 10 year, 10 year out in the world where Open Society Foundations just held the string out for him and now that you're back, I mean you've been back for a year and the sort of way that you've galvanized people around racial justice is really incredible and around the necessity of culture in the conversation for racial justice and so I would love for you to just speak a bit about your perspective and the way that you sort of see these things as braided together as you say. Perfect. It's not a surprise to me that the Schaumburg Center for Resource so I must admit, I feel like that was just a prophetic doorway into coming back into philanthropy from like one 35th to 57th and those worlds could not be further apart and what I wanted to do was to kind of bring those worlds together. It was interesting hearing Anjali as well as William talk about these words of illuminating and darkness and I do think this is the role of artist and if anything I believe that the artist is the soul of social justice movements and it was great to really hear so many people bring reverence to the great James Baldwin. I feel like you can't have a conversation about arts and social justice without thinking about Brother Jimmy. And just the sheer idea which I think is really clear here is that art actually illuminates that's the role of the artist to really take these dark, uncomfortable moments and to create another vision, a radical vision as someone said earlier in the presentation and so I do believe that if one takes on, I think in foundations I kind of think of myself as a curator that I'm pulling together various grants to sort of make a narrative story and that these grants have to make sense and that I have a whole template of things to sort of work with, right? Money being just one part of it but I think the partnership that you spoke of really making these things interconnected and making them very obvious. The other thing I just wanted to say that the idea of arts and social justice has always been with us. It's not new, it's like it might be new to you but it's not new, right? And I think one of the earlier, if you were to coin the phrase Afrofuturistic artist was Aaron Douglas. I think his work and actually creating an alternative vision during the Harlem Renaissance really made the pathway for what became the civil rights movement. If you don't have a vision of your people then you always stay where you are. And I think Douglas's murals were very much a part of that, right? So they showed up obviously in magazines. They showed up in books. They were very much a live part of really creating the milieu, the kind of excitement for both social justice demand but also vision. And so art has always been braided together inside these movements. Like if you were to close your eyes, these movements have songs, they have dances. They come with cultural creations that are necessary, right? It's not just the march but it's all the other cultural elements that are a part of it. The other next slide. Thank you. Thank you. And you know what's interesting is like we're currently in a moment right now thinking about culture, about who we are. I think American identity is changing and shifting. And in the past we actually had very strong identities of what kind of culture we were wanted to be. So you know these Robert E. Lee statues are very much about putting them in public spaces and they're really meant to celebrate someone and demean someone else. This question of who belongs, whose other, that's all raptured inside what art can do. And they also bring them to the fold that societies and civilizations have to change. When you think about just when regimes happen they necessarily have to shift the culture, right? They have to take down whatever ideas you have of gods, of culture and they have to replace them with something else. So even when you look at this current administration it's attack upon the national endowment is very clear, right? It's as much an attack on Muslim men as well as the artist industries. And if you miss that you're looking to be in shock because those things are really interdwelling. Also at OSF, you know, in rethinking ourselves I actually do run a civil justice portfolio. It's a racial justice portfolio. So it's not in the classic arts framework. I saw earlier my colleague Roberta Luna who's at Ford had an arts based project and we work together on some hip hop actives and work back in the, brrr. But anyway, we currently have a fellowship program that actually does support multidisciplinary works and it's because of Rashida we decided to also include artists and documentary makers. And so one of the artists that we supported was Hank Willis-Thomas who was also here earlier. Yeah. I should have brought that slide earlier. So what's interesting about Hank's work is that obviously it's this acrofit, right? That's actually right, symmetrically across from a statue of Frank Rizzo who was a mayor of Philadelphia who actually was just, just decimated black communities and also launched an attack upon the Black Panthers as well. And so what you are seeing is a public conversation about race without words. It's actually creating a space around who belongs, who doesn't, what does other mean, what does America mean. And it's actually all of these different ideals, right? Like the pic really is symbolic not just the notion of being black but actually belonging, right? So this conversation for us is really bringing together race and the arts so that they are much more realigned and really recognizing that we can actually do more. And the other thing, my final point is that I also recognize that people understand race through arts and culture. That's what people actually learn most about Muslim communities and American communities. They learn it through the media, they learn it through culture. So if we do not pay attention to those spaces that's gonna be our mistake as America currently re-envisions itself. Thank you. And I think that just to sort of ground us, my work at the Open Society Foundations works with all of the thematic and regional programs throughout 56 countries to encourage and support the inclusion of art and artists in human rights and social justice strategies. And I think it's a very radical model, experimental model, but I think we see that if we don't actually participate in the cultural narrative, we end up in this political moment. And so I'm really grateful for all of the work that all of you are doing to help us actually envision the reality and create the reality that we may not live to see, but that we need to get to collectively. Thank you.