Million Artist Movement Part 1

 

This was the patch I created by sewing and adding the message to contribute to one of this network’s beautiful patchwork quilts—and to put something beautiful into the energetic currency, because I believe words become things, and God does answer prayers—especially unselfish ones. 

 ❝Unity. From Minnesota to Nigeria. One world, one love. Stand in solidarity. Stop the violence. Speak up. You have a voice. You have a talent. Use it to build community wherever you go. Let your light shine!❞— Adebola 

From Minneapolis to Nigeria: A Prayer, a Prophecy, and a Patchwork of Resistance

By Coalition Against the Minnesota Paradox

June 12, 2016 | Minneapolis, MN

In a sunlit Hennepin County Government Center Court Yard in South Minneapolis, artists, organizers, and everyday revolutionaries gathered in a circle of intention. They were sewing—threading together patches of fabric, yes, but more than that, threading together stories, resistance, healing. This was the work of the Million Artist Movement (MAM)—a network of Black and brown artists and allies committed to Black liberation and building power through creativity and community. Their motto is simple: “Listen. Heal. Act.”

Founded on the principles of equity, expression, and direct engagement, MAM uses art as a vehicle for change. From quilt-making and freedom songs to public action and protest, the movement’s work is rooted in ancestral knowledge and forward-looking liberation. “We make art to heal. We make art to be free,” their site declares. In a society where systems are often weaponized against the very people they claim to serve, MAM is reweaving the torn cloth of community, one story at a time.

One such story is that of me, Adebola, a first-generation Yoruba woman born and raised in South Minneapolis. Her name means “the crown that meets with wealth,” but her life has been marked by systemic deprivation.

In 2003, Adebola and her family became entangled in what would prove to be a life-altering crisis within Minnesota’s Medicaid fraud: the PMAP and HBCB Waiver medical insurance programs. While serving Minnesota's sick and disabled for years in her own career—Adebola would be taken out of the workforce by a rare, serious and painful but manageable condition called Chiari Malformation.

Medical cost would become out of reach for income. Despite her love the people of Minnesota, that love wouldn't be returned—she and her entire family branch starting with her would be taken up by internal fraud at the Minnesota Department of Human Services. Her reports would be concealed, her complaints retaliated against. Relief would never come—there would never be an investigation. Three generations and counting destroyed, in silence, by a disability caused by the state and generations held in debilitation and destruction by the same force because Adebola is a pheromonal black woman.   

These programs, theoretically designed to serve disabled residents, instead blocked Adebola from accessing essential medical care through falsified record, fraudulent processes and criminal conduct by social workers employed at DHS and contracted with DHS. 

Over years of bureaucratic stonewalling and neglect, her health deteriorated. The untreated condition left her permanently and progressively disabled. Her body bears the wounds of a system that failed her. So does her family—left struggling socioeconomically, emotionally fragmented, and spiritually tested.

In the spirit of resistance and reclamation, Adebola found herself drawn to the Million Artist Movement. There, she contributed her story to one of the collective’s iconic patchwork quilts—living testaments of struggle and survival. Her patch was sewn with both grief and prophecy. It read:

"Unity. From Minnesota to Nigeria. One World, One Love. Stand In Solidarity. Stop The Violence. Speak Up. You Have a Voice, You Have a Talent, Use It To Build Community Wherever You Go. Let Your Light Shine!"

This wasn’t just a message. It was a declaration. A call to action. A transatlantic prayer that neither in the Americas of across the ocean shall Yoruba be robbed, exploited, derailed, delayed or contained by the remnants by colonial intention. Ase