All the feelings

I attended the opening session of the trial of the two people accused of killing Black teenager Larnell Bruce by chasing him in their Jeep and driving over his body in front of surveillance cameras. The small courtroom was packed with people supporting the Bruce family, as I was; supporters of the accused; and media. I went with my camera, but I didn’t take it out of the bag because Beth Nakamura was there, and I knew she would document the event brilliantly. Indeed, she made the photographs for the article I’ve linked, and the article describes the claims the defense is making. None of the witnesses who have commented over the past two years has said anything about Bruce having a knife (which the defense attorney alleges he had, and describes as a machete). A lawyer wrote on Facebook, “If the defense can create reasonable doubt or get less than first degree murder, they have succeeded for this sick guy, who is sick with hatred.”

After I left the courtroom, I met my friend Camilo at the Portland Art Museum to see an exhibit called “The Map Is Not the Territory,” about migration, decolonization, indigenous people, and our relationships with places on the earth. The photo above is of a piece created by Mary Ann Peters called “Impossible monument (flotsam).” According to her artist’s statement, “the work is based on a conversation with a Doctors Without Borders nurse who was part of a team instructing Yemeni fishermen on the etiquette for retrieving the belongings and remains of people lost in failed water crossings.”

A second piece (Extra) is a large number of ceramic sculptures made to look like falling stones and suspended from the ceiling by fishing wire. The artist is Annette Bellamy, who works as a commercial fisherwoman four months of the year so she can do art the remaining eight months. She says her art is a response to the sea and the land around her.