The American Civil Liberties Union of Texas and the National Coalition Against Censorship sent a mobile billboard to the University of North Texas campus Tuesday.
The billboard on a truck shows a simple message: “UNT admin censored Marka27’s art.” The billboard is a partnership between the two nonprofits and former Dallas resident turned Brooklyn-based street artist Victor Quiñonez, better known by his street art signature Marka27.
Both sides of the billboard include a QR code, which leads to a post penned by Quiñonez on the ACLU Texas website.
The mobile billboard is the latest move on the part of Quiñonez and the two advocacy groups in an ongoing critique of the university’s decision to remove Quiñonez’s exhibit “Ni de Aquí, Ni de Allá” (“Neither From Here, Nor From There”).
The exhibit might sting a little with its references to incarceration and deportation, but Quiñonez said its bright colors, glowing LED lights and humor are tributes, not condemnations, of America.
“I’d decided on the name ‘Ni de Aquí, Ni de Allá’ for my exhibition to honor my heritage,” Quiñonez says in his blog. “As immigrants, as Latinos, we are not from here, and we are not from there, because we are from both.
“To me, this is a form of empowerment,” he writes. “We can speak authentically to finding a home in the United States as well as maintaining our connections to where we were born or where our ancestors are from. I believe it’s completely possible to love two homelands at the same time.”
UNT administrators hadn’t replied to a Denton Record-Chronicle request for an interview or a statement by Tuesday evening.
The exhibit was open for about a week in February then remove and return all the art, which was on loan from Boston University.
It took time, but UNT President Harrison Keller and Provost Michael McPherson eventually said the exhibit was removed because the pieces that rebuke U.S. Immigrations and Customs Enforcement could have led to campus disruptions. Leaked transcripts from faculty and staff meetings showed that UNT officials fear reprisal from state lawmakers, who could retaliate by cutting funding.
The decision sparked student protests and denunciations from alumni, faculty and students of the art school.
The mobile billboard spent Tuesday afternoon driving around the UNT campus, conspicuously parking in front of the University Union, Willis Library and Hurley Administration Building, which houses Keller’s office.
Students took photos of the billboard as they passed. Several students pumped a fist toward it or flashed a thumbs-up. One passerby lifted a middle finger while hurrying by.
Freshman Kendra Garcia stopped to take a photo of the billboard. She’s studying art education in the College of Visual Arts and Design and said she saw Quiñonez’s exhibit on campus before officials removed it.
“It’s a whole ambitious critique on the U.S. government right now,” she said. “I was surprised because I thought UNT was, like, very progressive. I guess it’s not as progressive as I thought.”
She said the exhibit felt personal.
“Ever since Trump’s first election, I’ve been scared that ICE will deport my family,” Garcia said.
UNT is a Hispanic-Serving Institution, a federal designation that sometimes provides grant funding to universities with a Hispanic student enrollment of at least 25%. That the university would remove work by a Hispanic artist was shocking to some art students.
“I think it was pretty surprising to me, to be honest,” Garcia said. “UNT has a lot of Hispanic students and it just feels like they disregarded them.”
The ACLU of Texas said the mobile billboard will be moving around the Denton campus through Friday.
LUCINDA BREEDING-GONZALES can be reached at 940-566-6877 and cbreeding@dentonrc.com.
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