Two creators, one Black and one white, of a biting new BLM video – inspired by Frederick Douglass’s best-known speech and performed by Daveed Diggs – discuss their collaboration, how an 1852 speech matters so much right now, and why “white privilege” doesn’t go far enough.

“I was raised in the radical secular Jewish tradition. A central tenet of which is ‘always stand up for the underdog.’ That’s what my mom taught me being Jewish meant. I have a Jewish lens, a radicalized Jewish one at that – so when I look at a site or receive a commission, I consider the land, the history, the people. My composite read of psychogeography is gendered and Jewish, and centers womxn’s struggles and joy. Centering womxn uplifts the whole mishpucka. 

“As a social practice and conceptual artist, I have always been interested in distributed action and wellness. The idea for the Cell Phone Sleeping Bag for Reboot’s National Day of Unplugging came to me as a contemporary addition to my collection of just three very old Jewish family artifacts. My maternal ancestral line consisted of women-led households who worked on the Sabbath. For some reason, what I still have are things to hide things in. I drew on this history and conceived the idea of hiding one’s cell phone on the Sabbath and find screen-free rest and restoration.”
– Jessica Tully