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I think white artists have a responsibility to be not only naming white supremacy, but to be using their power and privilege to support artists of color.

Vivek Shraya

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Vivek Shraya
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More quotes by Vivek Shraya

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As a person of color, I know race can't be stripped from admiration or preference.
Vivek Shraya
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I couldn't write about love without writing about hate - specifically, how the experience of hatred embeds itself in the body and prevents love from entering or leaving.
Vivek Shraya
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Art can sometimes be separate from the artist.
Vivek Shraya
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I would love to see more dialogue around the responsibilities of art consumers - how can audiences better financially support artists we love, artists who are doing the work, so that artists have a more solid foundation upon which to make art?
Vivek Shraya
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It's exciting to consider how art, in its ability to reveal, can be ahead of the artist.
Vivek Shraya
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I continue to explore poetry.
Vivek Shraya
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As much as I believe in the capacity for art to create change, and as much as being an artist is physically and emotionally challenging, there is ultimately something a bit comfortable about making art in the comfort of your own home.
Vivek Shraya
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If anything, I have witnessed the ways my art travels, or is rendered more accessible, when sanctioned by or connected to white artists.
Vivek Shraya
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In my thirties, I have felt a greater urgency to make art that highlights what it feels like to be racialized, likely due to living in a country that obscures our racism with the idea of multiculturalism.
Vivek Shraya
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I am more likely to get paid for my art if it's presented alongside a white artist, so the questions around value and agency arise: What choices should I make, or do I have to make, if I want to be compensated for my work? Why isn't my art valued on its own?
Vivek Shraya
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I have been and continue to be committed to art as a tool to ignite, comfort, and discomfort.
Vivek Shraya
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I used singing as a safety measure. I would pay attention to what songs the popular girls liked, learn those songs from the radio or library cassettes, and then accidentally sing or hum these songs in class. This would impress the girls, who would then defend me from the boys.
Vivek Shraya
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I recently did a reading at an elementary school in Ottawa, and one of the children asked me if I was a girl. I said yes. Another child commented that I had a deep voice. I responded: Can girls have deep voices? There was a pause and then the group responded, Yes!
Vivek Shraya
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Children's books have great potential to reveal new possibilities to readers, because the intended audience is at an age of genuine learning.
Vivek Shraya
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I didn't want to give the white reader an opportunity to think of racism as imaginary - a sentiment that is already a central barrier in addressing the problem.
Vivek Shraya
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I have always considered the aesthetic of a project, including press photos, as a means to further the message of the art itself.
Vivek Shraya
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Writing about racism requires a directness that writing a love story does not.
Vivek Shraya
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I don't yet know what style will be required for my next novel, but my sense is that each book will involve a new relationship to language.
Vivek Shraya
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When I do book readings, I always incorporate music or singing.
Vivek Shraya
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I worry about what Trump will inspire in Canada, especially given incidents that have already occurred here since the election.
Vivek Shraya