Artwork / 2025 / Rümeysa Öztürk

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This portrait of Rümeysa Öztürk is like this one of Kilmar Abrego Garcia, a protest poster marking the cruelty and lawlessness of Trump’s second term, and both images fit in with other activist work I’ve made over the years, including this portrait of Anita Hill.

That said, they also remind me of the alphabet book that I put together in 2020, since I ended up painting a lot of names in the images from Baby Sees ABCs. In that case, I wasn’t trying to call attention to a systemic problem by portraying and naming a person like Öztürk or Abrego Garcia who’s been harmed by it. Rather, I was interested in teaching toddlers a variety of names from a variety of cultures as a way of encouraging them to marvel at the bigness of their human family.

You can see the making of Öztürk’s portrait.