Hank Willis Thomas Show Captures Art of Protest
With his new show, conceptual artist Hank Willis Thomas asks a simple question: Would you stand up for what you believe in?
Hank Willis Thomas came across the photo in 2014. The artist, whose work deals with identity, history and popular culture, often employs vintage images in his art. This one, taken in 1936, is of a crowd of Germans in a Homberg shipyard. Adolf Hitler has arrived to christen a ship, and as thousands “Seig Heil” the führer, one man stands, arms folded, a solitary figure of defiance in a sea of complicity.
Willis learned the man’s name, August Landmesser, and
