Fervent messages for the nation’s future.
Artists transform public space.
Inspired by Franklin D. Roosevelt’s 1941 proclamation of four basic American freedoms (freedom of speech, freedom of worship, freedom from war, freedom from fear) and Norman Rockwell’s Four Freedoms paintings, the For Freedoms organization, an artist-led coalition, was created in 2016 by Hank Willis Thomas, Eric Gottesman, Wyatt Gallery, and Michelle Woo, aiming to integrate artists’ voices into the political conversation. “What is the role of art in a democracy?” they asked, a question that seemed newly urgent after the 2016 election. Along with exhibitions and artist-led town hall meetings, the group engaged artists to create hundreds of billboards all across the country that, the artists hoped, would inspire in viewers a way to “better understand themselves, the world, and the artist’s experience.” Color photographs of billboards mounted between 2016 and 2023, along with textual commentary, convey hope, despair, and a call to activism—including the powerful act of voting. “Not voting is actually voting,” one billboard, erected in Flint, Michigan, warns. “Grab em by the Ballots” is the message on another. Many billboards respond to hot-button issues, including reproductive rights, climate change, racism, violence against Asians, indigenous rights, antisemitism, police brutality, gun violence, health care, and immigration: “Every Refugee Boat Is a Mayflower” announces one billboard in Maine. The words “Thoughts” and “Prayers” are superimposed on images of guns on a billboard in Cheyenne, Wyoming. “Your Body Your Business” appears in St. Louis, Missouri. “Think Science,” advises a billboard in Kentucky. The 2020 Awakening campaign was “a culmination of communal artistry, ideation, and visions for a radical future” that proposed four new freedoms: healing, awakening, justice, and listening. One billboard puts it simply: “Cultivate Care.”
Fervent messages for the nation’s future.Pub Date: Oct. 15, 2024
ISBN: 9781580936620
Page Count: 360
Publisher: The Monacelli Press
Review Posted Online: July 29, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 2024
BOOK REVIEW
A virtuoso performance and an ode to an undervalued medium created by two talented artists.
The veteran actor, comedian, and banjo player teams up with the acclaimed illustrator to create a unique book of cartoons that communicates their personalities.
Martin, also a prolific author, has always been intrigued by the cartoons strewn throughout the pages of the New Yorker. So when he was presented with the opportunity to work with Bliss, who has been a staff cartoonist at the magazine since 1997, he seized the moment. “The idea of a one-panel image with or without a caption mystified me,” he writes. “I felt like, yeah, sometimes I’m funny, but there are these other weird freaks who are actually funny.” Once the duo agreed to work together, they established their creative process, which consisted of working forward and backward: “Forwards was me conceiving of several cartoon images and captions, and Harry would select his favorites; backwards was Harry sending me sketched or fully drawn cartoons for dialogue or banners.” Sometimes, he writes, “the perfect joke occurs two seconds before deadline.” There are several cartoons depicting this method, including a humorous multipanel piece highlighting their first meeting called “They Meet,” in which Martin thinks to himself, “He’ll never be able to translate my delicate and finely honed droll notions.” In the next panel, Bliss thinks, “I’m sure he won’t understand that the comic art form is way more subtle than his blunt-force humor.” The team collaborated for a year and created 150 cartoons featuring an array of topics, “from dogs and cats to outer space and art museums.” A witty creation of a bovine family sitting down to a gourmet meal and one of Dumbo getting his comeuppance highlight the duo’s comedic talent. What also makes this project successful is the team’s keen understanding of human behavior as viewed through their unconventional comedic minds.
A virtuoso performance and an ode to an undervalued medium created by two talented artists.Pub Date: Nov. 17, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-250-26289-9
Page Count: 272
Publisher: Celadon Books
Review Posted Online: Aug. 30, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2020
PERSPECTIVES
A familiar format, but a timely reminder that cities are made up of individuals, each with their own stories.
Portraits in a post-pandemic world.
After the Covid-19 lockdowns left New York City’s streets empty, many claimed that the city was “gone forever.” It was those words that inspired Stanton, whose previous collections include Humans of New York (2013), Humans of New York: Stories (2015), and Humans (2020), to return to the well once more for a new love letter to the city’s humanity and diversity. Beautifully laid out in hardcover with crisp, bright images, each portrait of a New Yorker is accompanied by sparse but potent quotes from Stanton’s interviews with his subjects. Early in the book, the author sequences three portraits—a couple laughing, then looking serious, then the woman with tears in her eyes—as they recount the arc of their relationship, transforming each emotional beat of their story into an affecting visual narrative. In another, an unhoused man sits on the street, his husky eating out of his hand. The caption: “I’m a late bloomer.” Though the pandemic isn’t mentioned often, Stanton focuses much of the book on optimistic stories of the post-pandemic era. Among the most notable profiles is Myles Smutney, founder of the Free Store Project, whose story of reclaiming boarded‑up buildings during the lockdowns speaks to the city’s resilience. In reusing the same formula from his previous books, the author confirms his thesis: New York isn’t going anywhere. As he writes in his lyrical prologue, “Just as one might dive among coral reefs to marvel at nature, one can come to New York City to marvel at humanity.” The book’s optimism paints New York as a city where diverse lives converge in moments of beauty, joy, and collective hope.
A familiar format, but a timely reminder that cities are made up of individuals, each with their own stories.Pub Date: Oct. 7, 2025
ISBN: 9781250277589
Page Count: 480
Publisher: St. Martin's
Review Posted Online: Aug. 1, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 2025
© Copyright 2025 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
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