We choose for our first post after the culmination Saturday of a miraculous grassroots surge none other than James Baldwin. As part of her golden icon series, NATALIE HOPE MCDONALD captures the great man's dignity, humanity, defiance, courage and wondrous insight. The throughlines from Baldwin to our community are many, none closer to home than Giovanni's Room -- the Baldwin novel that became the eponymous and history-making LGBTQIA+ bookstore, now run by Philly AIDS Thrift, which we are very proud to call our neighbor. In fact, the store's location at 12th and Pine opened in 1979, shortly after the first Off the Wall show. Ever intrigued by social structures and drawn to the tides of politics, Baldwin's observations are timeless and always timely -- and burn anew with the torch that I Am Not Your Negro rekindled to full flame. In 1962, in the New York Times Review of Books, Baldwin wrote, "We are the generation that must throw everything into the endeavor to remake America into what we say we want it to be. Without this endeavor, we will perish." Fifteen and a half years later, in thoughts compiled by Robert Coles in the same publication, Baldwin this hard truth: "People can cry much easier than they can change.” Two score and three years later, we stand at a crossroads we have seen before, facing a not dissimilar crucible. We leave the last word to Baldwin, the next action to you. "Not everything that is faced can be changed, but nothing can be changed until it is faced."
NATALIE HOPE MCDONALD
"James Baldwin"
hand-drawn illustration
ink and pain on acid-free paper
125. framed
multiple unique originals available
