Intervention 1

The United States is boasted as the greatest country in the world. It is supposed to be the land where hopes and dreams come true, the land of the free where all are welcomed. In reality, the United States is a country that runs on a facade of bling and money. Fancy cars, fancy buildings, flashing city lights, these are all intentionally used as the face of America. Money has become an important aspect of life. Without money, there would be no roof to live under, and no food or television to watch. It has become nearly irrefutable that money is "king". At least that's what they want you to think. The United States is the placeholder for many luxury brands, where flexing your money is seen as more admirable than getting an education. On Instagram, you will likely see influencers wearing diamond chains, gold Rolex watches, and riding fancy cars that cost more than a down payment for a house. We get stuck on the mentality of needing to "get rich quick" that we sometimes turn a blind eye to other issues going on in the world. The U.S. government knows this best and has developed a system to keep minorities poor and privileged rich. My intervention is on the toxic, money-hungry mentality the United States has pushed onto its citizens and how they use that mentality to derail us from bigger issues in the United States. To capture this intervention, I designed a poster to put out in public.

Before

Facade of Riches

I call this poster "Facade of Riches". The poster itself is a facade, until you connect all the dots. I decided to use the saying, "Get your money up!!!" because it is a popular saying that many people can resonate with. It is a popular saying that is used on social media to "inspire" people to get into the money-focused mindset. If you look at the eyes of the person on the poster, you can see swirls in their eyes. The swirls indicate that the person is currently hypnotized by the saying. They are currently in a money-focused mindset and are made to think that money should be their primary goal. If you look further down the poster you can see three different equations. Money equals the government, and the government equals systematic oppression, so that means money equals systematic oppression. I used this formula to show that money is produced by the government, and the government is the one that has created a system that oppresses minorities. The United States government wants you to focus on the production of money to keep a blind eye to the unfairness they created in their system. 

This poster is inspired by a song called, "This is America" by Childish Gambino. “This is America” is a thought-provoking music video that more or less makes fun of American society. "Facts and truth don't speak for themselves. They need to be made into symbols and incorporated into stories that people can make sense of and care about," as stated in The Art of Activism, Your All-Purpose Guide to Making the Impossible Possible (page 25). Instead of directly speaking about the topic, Childish Gambino gives viewers a P.O.V. into the world of the United States. He crafts a story that touches on issues in the United States. His music video was screaming for us to watch and catch the meanings behind everything in the video. In the music video, the Childish Gambino could be seen dancing and using extreme facial expressions to make us try to focus on him. Behind his dancing and silly facial expressions was pure chaos. Guns, violence, and gang activities could be seen actively happening as Childish Gambino sang. His dancing and facial expression can be symbolic of a facade America puts up to distract people from the issues occurring in America. Childish Gambino would sing, "We just want to party, we just want money.” These lyrics poke at the fact that, on the outside, the United States paints its citizens as party people who are only trying to make money. Deep down, behind the money and parties are homelessness, racism, sexism, and the list continues. I took inspiration from his lyrics and put "Get your money up!!!"

Update: Since my posters on West Side Avenue was drowned by the weather, I was able to get some interactive feedback from the class. It was an insightful day to hear feedback about my project, but also watch other people present their intervention. It was inspiring to say the less, how much power we have in art and spoken words. On the updated poster, I decided to take away the bottom part of the poster and put something else entirely. The professor had bought to my attention that the government was not our enemy. The system we are in is harmful and problematic, but the government is there to help us. Instead I decided to focus on other aspects of how money can be harmful. There are many rich corporations out there that continue to mistreat their employees and sit behind billions of dollars. A classmate had mentioned the saying, "Eat the rich" which I thought was brilliant. We continually let big companies make big mistakes without consequences. Something I had always questioned is how we let corporations like Target make Black History Month merchandise. Instead of making donations to any foundations, these big corporations are instead making money off of Black History Month. As a single person it can feel impossible to tackle on these big corporations, but if we can unite as people we can make a big change. I used start a union, because I was inspired by talking about unionizing in class. As a whole, unionizing is amazing, but I see it as a symbol of standing forward together with others. I put start a union because it is a way for us to face big companies and corporate billionaires. We have to continue to find ways to fight back against the money hungry mindset.