'Artivist' Nikkolas Smith Combines Art And Activism Into A Singular Superpower
For the past seven years, the Los Angeles-based artist has celebrated and mourned Black lives in his work. Smith's portraits are sometimes unfinished — a reflection of Black lives cut short.
Nikkolas Smith calls himself an "artivist": an artist and an activist. For the past seven years, the Los Angeles-based concept artist has celebrated and mourned Black lives in his work. He says he's following the lead of the late singer Nina Simone, who advised it's the artist's duty to reflect the times.
"I'm always looking at what's going in the world and trying to reflect that," Smith says. "There are so many Black lives that have just been taken from this Earth. I've been trying to trying to process how that made me feel as a Black man."
Smith's portrait of George Floyd, whose killing by a police officer sparked worldwide protests against police abuse, is now in New York's Times Square and
