David Zukas

Artwork

  • Our educational system is perpetuating the myth of black inferiority. Why are we teaching millions of children that they come from slaves? That scope is too myopic. Teach them that they come from kings, queens, doctors, warriors, weavers, drummers, dancers, farmers, mathematicians, mothers, fathers, sons and daughters.This is part of a series to be auctioned to benefit Sheenway Schools in LA and Ghana.
  • {quote}We the people{quote} was a powerful beginning in 1787 but it did not include black people, brown people, native people or women. African people were here creating this nation long before it was a nation.This flag is an homage to them and along with other work will be put up for auction to benefit Sheenway School in LA and Ghana.
  • {quote}We the people{quote} was a powerful beginning in 1787 but it did not include black people, brown people, native people or women. African people were here creating this nation long before it was a nation.This flag is an homage to them and along with other work will be put up for auction to benefit Sheenway School in LA and Ghana.
  • {quote}Bold to defend forever...{quote} This is my black star of hope and honour, part of a series of artworks being auctioned for Sheenway Schools in Watts and Sasekofe.
  • {quote}Bold to defend forever...{quote} This is my black star of hope and honour, part of a series of artworks being auctioned for Sheenway Schools in Watts and Sasekofe.
  • Sankofa- one must return to the past in order to move forward.This is part of a series of artwork to be auctioned to benefir Sheenway Schools in LA and Ghana.
  • Sankofa - detail
  • The crab moves side to side but is always making progress.- Ewe ProverbIn Twi the crab is called okoto. The Akan say the crab is hard to draw out of it's hole, but once out is a fierce warrior.In Haiti, {quote}ti crab{quote} is a term of endearment or affection for a loved one meaning little crab.This is part of a series to be auctioned to benefit Sheenway Schools in LA and Ghana.
  • Okoto - detail
  • Sankofa and Okoto
  • Sheenway School in Sasekofe, Volta Region, Ghana's motto is {quote}The Promise of Immortality.{quote} Because this artwork is being auctioned to benefit Sheenway Schools in LA and Ghana, I was thinking about the relationship between the two schools, between two countries, between a mother and a daughter. This is a mother and daughter profile both looking inward.
  • Because this artwork is being auctioned to benefit Sheenway Schools in LA and Ghana, I was thinking about the relationship between the two schools, between two countries, between a mother and a daughter. This is a mother and daughter profile both looking inward.
  • $6000Scarecrows originated in Africa to watch over crops and were symbolic guardians of future generations. Today scarecrows are thought of as totems of death and fear and this speaks of the horrors inflicted upon people of color, but simultaneously represent hope and prosperity. Too many of these living sentinels throughout history have been dismissed and abandoned in a field to wither. This painting was inspired by Frederick Douglass' {quote}What to the Slave is the Fourth of July?{quote}
  • $6000Scarecrows originated in Africa to watch over crops and were symbolic guardians of future generations. Today scarecrows are thought of as totems of death and fear and this speaks of the horrors inflicted upon people of color, but simultaneously represent hope and prosperity. Too many of these living sentinels throughout history have been dismissed and abandoned in a field to wither. This painting was inspired by Frederick Douglass' {quote}What to the Slave is the Fourth of July?{quote}
  • $4000If wounds are not treated properly, they can become infected and kill the host.From slavery to Jim Crow to the current prison system, the United States needs to treat this wound.
  • Congenital Wound detail
  • Congenital Wound detail
  • $7000Our educational system is perpetuating the myth of black inferiority. Pick up any history textbook and you'll find children of all colors are brainwashed into believing only white males had any impact on the founding and building of our nation. Nothing could be further from the truth. When black and brown children are finally introduced to people who look like them, the topic is slavery. Why are we telling millions of children that they come from slaves? This scope is too myopic. What were they before they were enslaved? They were kings, queens, doctors, warriors, weavers, drummers, dancers, scientists, farmers, merchants, mothers, fathers, sons and daughters. Unlock Africa. We are incarcerating an entire culture.
  • $7000Our educational system is perpetuating the myth of black inferiority. Pick up any history textbook and you'll find chldren of all colors are brainwashed into believing only white males had any impact on the founding and building of our nation. Nothing could be further from the truth. When black and brown children are finally intorduced to people who look like them, the topic is slavery. Why are we telling millions of children that they come from slaves? This scope is too myopic. What were they before they were enslaved? They were kings, queens, doctors, warriors, weavers, drummers, dancers, scientists, farmers, merchants, mothers, fathers, sons and daughters. Unlock Africa. We are incarcerating an entire culture.
  • Our educational system is perpetuating the myth of black inferiority. Pick up any history textbook and you'll find children of all colors are brainwashed into believing only white males had any impact on the founding and building of our nation. Nothing could be further from the truth. When black and brown children are finally introduced to people who look like them, the topic is slavery. Why are we telling millions of children that they come from slaves? This scope is too myopic. What were they before they were enslaved? They were kings, queens, doctors, warriors, weavers, drummers, dancers, scientists, farmers, merchants, mothers, fathers, sons and daughters. Unlock Africa. We are incarcerating an entire culture.
  • Our educational system is perpetuating the myth of black inferiority. Pick up any history textbook and you'll find children of all colors are brainwashed into believing only white males had any impact on the founding and building of our nation. Nothing could be further from the truth. When black and brown children are finally introduced to people who look like them, the topic is slavery. Why are we telling millions of children that they come from slaves? This scope is too myopic. What were they before they were enslaved? They were kings, queens, doctors, warriors, weavers, drummers, dancers, scientists, farmers, merchants, mothers, fathers, sons and daughters. Unlock Africa. We are incarcerating an entire culture.
  • Our educational system is perpetuating the myth of black inferiority. Pick up any history textbook and you'll find children of all colors are brainwashed into believing only white males had any impact on the founding and building of our nation. Nothing could be further from the truth. When black and brown children are finally introduced to people who look like them, the topic is slavery. Why are we telling millions of children that they come from slaves? This scope is too myopic. What were they before they were enslaved? They were kings, queens, doctors, warriors, weavers, drummers, dancers, scientists, farmers, merchants, fathers, mothers, sons and daughters. Unlock Africa. We are incarcerating an entire culture.
  • Our educational system is perpetuating the myth of black inferiority. Pick up any history textbook and you'll find children of all colors are brainwashed into believing only white males had any impact on the founding and building of our nation. Nothing could be further from the truth. When children of color are finally introduced to people who look like them, the topic is slavery. Why are we telling millions of children they come from slaves? This scope is too myopic. What were they before they were enslaved? They were kings, queens, scientists, farmers, warriors, weavers, drummers, dancers, merchants, fathers, mothers, sons and daughters. Unlock Africa. We are incarcerating an entire culture.
  • $6000Sankofa! Sankofa! Sankofa! Those in a position of power who do not know their history should be sent back to fix it. If somebody owned, raped and slaughtered you in the name of sugarcane, then maybe you would think differently.
  • SOLDFor those who woke up November 9th and realized that half of the registered voters were potentially racist, sexist, homophobic xenophobes... {quote}wake up, take the pillow from your head and put a book in it.{quote}This was the same old fear tactic that received commercial success in D.W.Griffith's The Birth of a Nation over 100 years ago. Now, more than ever, we must recognize and remember all the insurgents that came before us and sacrificed their lives in the making of this country. Many that we revere today were targeted and labeled subversives, agitators, troublemakers and insurgents. My hope is that the legacy of these people informs and inspires us. We've a long way to go.
  • detail of Insurgent
  • $6000Nana Asma'u was a poet, teacher and warrior princess in West Africa in the early 1800's. She was an Islamic feminist long before women had any rights in the United States. Read about her story and pass through this door.
  • Nana-Asma_u-door-Brooklyn-loft
  • $6000Charles Bukowski was a prolific underground writer who used his poetry and prose to depict the depravity of urban life and the downtrodden in American society. Bluebird by Charles BukowskiThere's a bluebird in my heart that wants to get outbut I'm too tough for him,I say, stay in there, I'm not going to let anybody see you.There's a bluebird in my heart that wants to get outbut I pour whiskey on him and inhale cigarette smokeand the whores and the bartenders and the grocery clerksnever know that he's in there.There's a bluebird in my heart that wants to get outbut I'm too tough for him,I say, stay down, do you want to mess me up? you want to screw up the works? you want to blow my book sales in Europe? There's a bluebird in my heart that wants to get outbut I'm too clever, I only let him outat night sometimes when everybody's asleep.I say, I know that you're there,so don't be sad.then I put him back,but he's singing a little in there, I haven't quite let him dieand we sleep together like thatwith our secret pactand it's nice enough to make a man weep, but I don't weep, do you?
  • sliding-door-charles-bukowski
  • $6000This is an Uncle Tupelo tribute on a 1940's screen door from a house in upstate New York. The aluminum screen is transparent and opaque at the same time (difficult to capture in photo). The wood border has thousands of images telling their story.
  • sliding-door-rust-in-peace
  • Rust in Peace detail
  • SOLDThis is an Adinkra symbol repeated three times. It translates to {quote}He who does not know can know from learning.{quote} Adinkra symbols are like proverbs telling the story of West Africa. This is the symbol of learning and the quest for knowledge.
  • Brooklyn-apartment
  • SOLDHigh above Petionville sits a community of cinder block homes clutching to the mountainside. The homes are packed together and in danger of mudslides during the rainy season yet they are a majestic city in the sky. Currently the government is painting every home in this poverty striken area in a variety of pastel colors. This is the epitome of Haiti: beauty versus poverty, class struggle, the artistry of a culture on the edge.
  • SOLDThis is my homage to the late great Nelson Mandela. Who better to grace a door as a metaphor? Not only did he serve over 27 years for his beliefs behind a locked door, he opened many doors with his activism on human rights around the world.
  • mandela-door-in-loft
  • SOLDAlong the way to becoming the first free black nation Haiti defeated three imperial powers: France, Spain and Great Britain.
  • SOLDKatherine Dunham was the Queen of black dance. The cacophony of overlapping images pasted to the door are of Katherine at all stages of her life and of friends, family and students, many of which were famous.
  • SOLDI literally burned Renaissance to ashes, on top of which I painted my vision for the future of Haiti. The profiled sentinels (composed of sankofa, the adinkra symbol) are guarding the akwaaba doll (composed of a cast of my protege, Trumaine Simpson) or the symbol for life.
  • $4000This door was inspired by Alberto Giacometti's existentialist post war sculptures. I intended to capture the haunting gangly yet enduring shadow like figure that Giacometti portrayed.
  • SOLD Teaching in Brownsville in Brooklyn inspired me to re-read my Saul Williams collection and make this homage to him. While Chuck Close was exhibiting for the first time at MoMA in Manhattan, something equally as special was rising in the Fort Greene area in Brooklyn. Saul and many others inspired us all and made Brooklyn a vibrant scene. Go see Saul Williams perform and pass through this door.
  • SOLDFor many religion is a necessity. Science and nature are my only truth.When I first met my wife, she gave me Daniel Kedar's book, {quote}Haiti: Reflections.{quote} I am eternally grateful to him for introducing her homeland to me. Faith and Truth and Adrift are inspired by his photographs.
  • SOLDI lived without running water and electricity in Ghana. Despite extreme difficulties in the so called third world, there is a beauty in the simplicity of life.When I first met my wife, she gave me Daniel Kedar's book, {quote}Haiti: Reflections.{quote} I am eternally grateful to him for introducing her homeland to me. Faith and Truth and Adrift are inspired by his photographs.
  • $8,000Free doom or freedom? Nothing worthwhile can be gained without suffering. Nobody suffers like the poor in the struggle to be free.Freedoom was inspired by Maderno's Saint Cecilia sculpture in marble in Trastevere, Rome.
  • $6000As hard as you, me, or anyone has it in this economy spiraling out of control, just remember you are not dependent on a tarp for a home in Port-au-Prince, Haiti.
  • $5000I love hip hop. I love that my generation gave birth to a new genre of music. Having said that, if you can only rap about cars, clothes and jewelry then you are a slave to materialism. Your ancestors were bought and sold as material possessions and all you can rap about are material possessions. Who has the bigger chain?
  • SOLDNew emigrants to the U$ leave behind valuable pieces of their culture in order to assimilate. I created a Ghanaian akwaaba doll out of scrap materials (muffler, trash can lid, pvc pipe, tin can). An akwaaba doll represents ideal beauty and welcomes a new child into this world. The culture of America, unfortunately, is based on material possessions as represented with the iconic French pattern. The leather whip as a penis speaks to the original West Africans who had their culture forcibly removed.
  • $6000In Ave Dakpa, Ghana, I witnessed a man fall to the ground, go into a trance and have his eyes roll back into his head during a ceremony.
  • NFSAssemblage sculpture made up of recycled tools of the art trade: brushes, canvas, paint tubes, books and containers.
  • NFSAll artists are fertile and creators of life. The shirt was soaked in resin and formed in a cast of my wife’s pregnant torso. A Haitian woman bringing life into this uncertain world is also surely symbolic of the potential rebirth of Port-au-Prince and Haiti after the recent earthquakes.
  • SOLDOur ultimate demise may be the inability to identify with others. If we wait to act until we are the ones affected, it will be too late. Many in Haiti and around the world are rightfully questioning their faith.
  • SOLD Commissioned piece- this was an obvious play on the word {quote}King.{quote} I was asked to paint a portrait of the Reverend Doctor Martin Luther King, Jr. so I imagined him being canonized as a true King of kings.
  • SOLDAnnuit Coeptis or Providence in Favor of Our Cause.Is God on America's side in the endeavor to give money for rebuilding Haiti? Is God on Haiti's side? Do we only give money to make ourselves feel better? What did your text of $10 actually do? Will you still care about the plight of Haiti 6 months or 6 years from now?
  • SOLDHaitians are without a home. Their ancestors were stolen from Africa and brought to Haiti where they were forced to work cane fields as slaves. The island of Hispianola is not their home. Many have immigrated to the U$ where they have been treated as second class citizens. The U$ is not their home. If they returned to Africa, they may be treated as Kings and Queens but only as tourists. They will not be welcomed home because the cultural differences are far too great to be treated as a brother or sister. Haitians and all black people in the U$ can never go home. They are a people without a country.
  • SOLDI seriously started contemplating myself as a consumer when I brought another human being into this world. It matters more than ever what I buy, how it is produced, where it comes from, and where it goes after being consumed. The mantra changed from “consume, consume, consume” to “reduce, reuse, recycle.” This idea is a gateway, not unlike this door, through which I find myself passing every day of my life.
  • SOLDTitian’s Venus of Urbino had nothing on my Afro-dite or Urban Venus. A woman of color fits nicely in place of the Renaissance ideal beauty. I thank Sarah Loubeau for sitting for the portrait. Although a specific and very beautiful Haitian portrait was used, this Venus is symbolic for all women of color.
  • $8,000Most think of a door as a restraint or barrier. I have been thinking of doors as a gateway, portal, or vestibule. I want to visualize transformative ideas so that one changes after passing through or consuming them. You are not what you own. In this economy it is important to realize most people on this earth do not have electricity or running water. The Kumasi market is far from what most imagine when conjuring images of Whole Foods or your local grocery store, but it serves the same purpose and is alive with sights, sounds and smells.
  • NFSFor centuries millions of Africans went through the infamous door of no return at Ghana’s Cape Coast Castle. This was a gateway through which many passed and died on the perilous journey across the Atlantic. The fortunate survivors arrived in the Americas as slaves.West African Adinkra symbols are much like proverbs. The symbol Sankofa is repeatedly carved into the door. Sankofa tells us we can return and fix it. We can remind ourselves and our children that suffering continues today because of ills 500 years old. We can never trample upon people because of their color, culture or class. Yet we do it every day. What lesson have we learned?
  • SOLD500 years of oppression force present day Haitian descendants of Africa to willingly risk their lives on rickety boats and cross treacherous waters to make it to the land of ill and money. Unfortunately those few who survive the trip wind up in Krome Detention Center, otherwise known as jail. There they are detained until being repatriated. We give political asylum to Cubans when they arrive even though many say they are leaving desperate economic conditions. With numerous regime changes Haitians flee political persecution and cannot stay because of economic reasons.Years ago, didn’t European ancestors flee to the Americas for the same reasons? We don’t acknowledge Haiti, the second independent nation in the western hemisphere and first free black nation, even though we would be speaking French right now had it not been for Toussaint L’Ouverture defeating Napoleon. When will our political, economic, social, spiritual, and emotional doors be open to Haiti?
  • SOLD Sankofa was created to benefit Sheenway School and Culture Center's noble undertaking of creating a school in the Volta Region in Ghana.
  • SOLD
  • $8,000The funeral of the Ashanti King was awe inspiring. Bamboo reeds were transformed into bones of the ancestors.
  • SOLDCures for anything can be found at the Kumasi market.
  • $1000Cedi's or cowrie shells were the first form of currency in Ghana. Capitalism and the ills of money worship have seeped into most every culture.
  • SOLD
  • SOLD
  • This bass was a commission for a former student, Mike Lonuzzi. This is a photo montage of what I deemed to be the greatest guitarists of all time.
  • This bass was a commission for a former student, Mike Lonuzzi. This is a photo montage of what I deemed to be the greatest guitarists of all time.
  • This bass was a commission for a former student, Mike Lonuzzi. This is a photo montage of what I deemed to be the greatest guitarists of all time.
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