BARSON (Original Painting)

30" x 40" stretched canvas, painted on front and back: Acrylic paint, acrylic marker, oil pastels, book covers, graffiti paint markers, book pages (John Milton's essay on liberty of the press and John Locke's essay on reading), sharpie, highlighter, india ink, gel medium, glow-in-the-dark pigment powders (blue, pink, green, yellow), mirror chrome marker, adhesive, holographic prism powder, and spray paint. PEN America, a literary and free expression organization, published an article earlier this year that grabbed my attention and shook me to my core as a lover of books: from July 2021 to June 2022, over 1,600 individual titles were banned in 138 school districts across 32 states. Most of the books targeted by local, state, and national groups for removal featured LGBTQ+ characters or characters of color, and/or cover race and racism in American history, LGTBQ+ identities, or sex education. The censorship movement, shockingly, continues to grow, even targeting public libraries with i