# @drawingcenter on Instagram

- **Type:** Image
- **Original URL:** https://www.instagram.com/p/Bys5D46luic
- **Gondola URL:** https://gondola.cc/posts/16044609-drawingcenter-instagram
- **Thumbnail:** https://img.gondola.cc/tr:w-,h-,fo-auto/thumbnails/a372c541a5.jpg
- **Posted:** 2019-06-14T19:11:08.000+00:00
- **Account Owner:** The Drawing Center (@drawingcenter) — https://gondola.cc/drawingcenter

## Caption

Artists have a variety of methods to make their mark. Every Friday we will share a photograph of an #ArtistInAction.
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Sun Ra (1914–1993) was an Afrofuturist jazz musician, artist, and visionary who lived according to his own personal mythology, which posited him as being a Saturn-born citizen of Outer Space. Sun Ra conceptualized Outer Space as a place for “altered destiny” in which black and brown identities could prosper and the oppressed on earth would hold power. Donning elaborate caftans and sculptural headdresses, Sun Ra led an avant-garde improvisational jazz group he named “the Arkestra.” The ensemble wore space age costumes that were also inspired by ancient Egypt, and played music that imagined this “altered destiny” that expelled racism and discrimination. Speaking at a youth center, Sun Ra emphatically asked: “How do you know I’m real? I’m not real. I’m just like you. You don’t exist in this society. If you were, your people wouldn’t be seeking equal rights. If you were, you’d have some status among the nations of the world. I come to you as a myth… I come to you from a dream the black man dreamed long ago. I’m actually a present sent to you by your ancestors.”
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Image: Photograph by Jim Newman, 1974. Courtesy of Portland Art Museum.

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## Tags

artistinaction

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