Danielle DeRoberts & Lindee Zimmer
Location: 13th and Balsam
Photo by Peter Kowalchuk
Danielle DeRoberts and Lindee Zimmer collaborated on this mural project to bring awareness to climate change and more specifically climate justice. Climate justice is a concept that addresses the just division, fair sharing, and equitable distribution of the benefits and burdens of climate change and the responsibilities to deal with climate change. In addition to environmental and physical changes, the climate crisis also has ethical, legal, and political consequences that disproportionately affect Indigenous peoples, people of color, and low-income communities. Ultimately, those least responsible for climate change suffer its most dire consequences.
The mural features two amazing voices and activists, Ean Thomas Tafoya (@believeean) and Kamutaja Ãwa (@survivalinternational). Give them a follow to learn more about and support their work!
Ean (aka Mr. Denver) is a community activist and human rights advocate. He currently serves as the Director of the Colorado GreenLatinos, the state chapter of a non-profit that convenes Latino leaders to address national and local environmental issues that affect the U.S. Latino community. Ean is extremely active in local, state, and federal politics and public policy, having worked for three branches of local and federal government, run for Denver City Council, and directed multiple local and state political races. Ean has received recognition for his work from the Denver Regional Council of Governments and the Denver Regional Air Quality Council, and most recently was named a River Hero by the National River Network. He uses the media to uplift locals in the community.
Kamutaja Ãwa is a member of the Ãwa tribe of Brazil. The Ãwa tribe is an uncontacted tribe, meaning the community chooses to live without sustained contact with neighboring communities as well as the global community. Her family members survived a massacre that took place when outsiders hunted down her family and took them away, forcing contact with the outside world. She fears for her relatives who live in the Mata do Mamão (Papaya Forest) and have the right to remain isolated if they choose. She believes it’s important to protect their right to self-determination and to protect their ancestral lands from colonization even if it means putting her life at risk. The human rights organization Survival International has been working with the Ãwa tribe and other Indigenous, tribal, and uncontacted peoples worldwide, focusing specifically on protecting their land rights and self-determination.
The mural features Ean and Kamutaja gazing strongly yet solemnly in the distance. Ean wears a red handprint across his face, referencing the #MMIWG2S movement. Their hands reach out and intertwine with radiating and magnetic energies, energies prevalent in both Lindee’s and Danielle’s artworks. The artists explore the delicate balance between emitting and attracting such energies, which we attract to heal from personal and generational trauma and then radiate out into the world to help others. As Ean and Kamutaja gaze and extend their hands toward the future generations on the opposite side of the mural, they emit energy, resources, and ideas into the world that will benefit Earth’s current and future populations.
Lindee and Danielle’s mural explores humanity’s time and impact on the planet. Since the Industrial Revolution, human beings, and especially white Euro-Americans, have disproportionately impacted the climate and the environment in pursuit of wealth and profit and with a disregard for the well-being of the planet. Too often, environmentalism is seen through the lens of white people. Lindee and Danielle’s mural aims to focus our attention on BIPOC communities, voices, and activism. Indigenous peoples have maintained a balanced relationship with the Earth for hundreds of thousands of years. As we work to fight the climate crisis, we need to uplift and listen to BIPOC activists, who often experience the greatest effects of climate change, carry ancestral knowledge about land stewardship, and offer ideas about environmental public policy that would benefit all people.
LINKS:
Thank you to Madaline & Sam and the Phoenix Asylum for sponsoring this mural.
