ACLU’s new Arts & Business Justice Collaborative will enlist support from civic leaders, business owners, and artists
NEW ORLEANS – New Orleans-based mixed-media artist Ashley Longshore has donated $33,500 to the ACLU of Louisiana’s work to combat police violence from the proceeds of her portrait of Breonna Taylor and other works from her latest release. The portrait of Taylor was purchased by a collector and donated to the Taylor family.
“We are so grateful for Ashley’s incredible talent and generosity in memorializing Breonna in such a beautiful way that will fuel our fight against police violence and brutality,” said Alanah Odoms Hebert, ACLU of Louisiana executive director. “Breonna’s legacy lives on in the fight for Black lives, and we must continue to honor her with action against racist policing and violence.”
Longshore is a member of the ACLU of Louisiana’s newly-launched Arts & Business Justice Collaborative, made up of community culture bearers and business owners who are committed to using their platforms to support the ACLU of Louisiana’s work. Together, the arts and business community will leverage their economic and cultural capital to advance real change in Louisiana, with a focus on reforming the criminal legal system, protecting immigrants’ rights, safeguarding the right to vote, and challenging unconstitutional policing.
“None of us can be silent while the police officers who murdered Breonna Taylor continue to evade justice, and while Black and Brown people continue to be killed with impunity,” said Longshore. “As an artist and business owner, I’m committed to supporting the fight for Black lives and honoring the memory of those whose lives have been lost. Breonna was brutally killed in the prime of her life– but her memory will live on, not only in our hearts, but in our actions.”
Longshore has been compared to a young, feminist Andy Warhol. From George Washington in a Supreme hoodie to Jesus surrounded in Louis Vuitton to Kate Moss as a nun, Longshore’s paintings, focusing on pop culture, Hollywood glamour, and American consumerism, are never shy of daring – her art makes noise. Dubbed by The New York Times as “Fashion’s Latest Art Darling,” Longshore has emblazoned the path for pop art and fashion to coexist.
Justice Lab: Putting Racist Policing on Trial is an intensive litigation effort to combat police violence and empower the communities of color they target. The campaign enlists for-profit law firms and law school legal clinics in bringing cases challenging racially-motivated stops and seizures under the Fourth and Fourteenth Amendments and any other applicable laws. By focusing intensive efforts on a single state, the initiative aims to establish a litigation blueprint for altering police conduct across the country.
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