Art was not an after-school program.

Art was not motivational speaking.

Art was not sentimental.

It had no responsibility to be hopeful or optimistic

   or make anyone feel better about the world.

 

It must reflect the world in all its brutality and beauty,

   not in hopes of changing it

   but in the mean and selfish desire to not be enrolled in its lie,

   to not be coopted by the television dreams,

   to not ignore the great crimes all around us.

Ta-Nehisi Coates

We Were Eight Years In Power

2017, page 88