Brandon Drew HolmesThought. In. Progress: Elf Lives Matter, 2015Mixed media
insensitive title tho
I’m Black. The piece is about the the parallels between Black people, the Civil Rights fight and the house elves in J.K. Rowling’s Harry Potters series. If you read the series through and through it’s clear that what Rowling is situating with the Potter world is a holocaust scenario, but within this narrative is the reality of cattle slavery made visible by the house elves. You can’t see it clearly in this image, but the sheet on the floor depicts the acronyms NAACP, SPEW and HELF. NAACP of course stands for the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (founded by white people) and SPEW/HELF refer to the groups started by Hermione Granger (and mocked by Harry Potter and Ron Weasley). All three of these groups have in common white guilt (in Hermione’s case “human/witch guilt”) and an inability to actually assess what the oppressed individual’s desires and needs are in their moment of “liberation” Within the books Harry and Ron represent two other realities of white people... Harry, indifferent but moved to act if it effects him personally (hence the dirty sock on the sculpture and the page from the book which has been altered to read Harry Potter the Half-Assed Ally, alluding to his freeing of Dobby, but lack of interest and subsequent ignorance in what happens to Dobby afterwards) and Ron unmoved and complacent with the social/power structure of the world that enables him to be (when he introduces the reality of house elves to his friends he does so in a “it is what it is” tone as well as mocking Hermione upon caring about and attempting to “liberate” the house elves, on top of his instant disdain for Kreacher not as a supporter of the enemy, but a house elf). All in all there is a lot to the piece, but the title itself is inspired from white people’s ability to believe in and consume narratives such as Harry Potter, but respond with statements such as “all LIVES matter” when confronted with their races literal history and presence. But yea... this is one of the issue with the way we consume imagery/art online... content, intention and identity of the producer are more often than not removed.
