Arts
fromHyperallergic
2 weeks agoThe Importance of Making "Degenerate" Art
Art can be deliberately non-neutral and ethically engaged, refusing neutrality, civility, and institutional comfort to confront injustice and amplify marginalized voices.
In the summer of 2020, I was working as a paralegal in Austin, Texas, remotely filling out asylum applications for migrants who were trapped in a dangerous limbo. A landmark policy of the first Trump administration-euphemistically called the "Migrant Protection Protocols," or MPP-was keeping tens of thousands of immigrants stateless and often homeless in Mexico's border regions while their asylum cases were adjudicated in U.S. border courts.