‘The impossible is what we do’: A new art project honors neighborhood ‘Staying Power’

Stephan Salisbury, Philadelphia Inquirer , May 23, 2021

From that homage to persistence to Ebony G. Patterson’s She is…, four monumental murals of women in mourning, mounted on neighborhood building walls, is not as lengthy an artistic journey as it might seem at first.

One of four murals by artist Ebony G. Patterson, "She Is..." presides over Ile Ife Park, next door to the Village of Arts and Humanities. It reads, "She is the soil."
One of four murals by artist Ebony G. Patterson, "She Is..." presides over Ile Ife Park, next door to the Village of Arts and Humanities. It reads, "She is the soil."TOM GRALISH / Staff Photographer

As Patterson says in her artist’s statement: “Here we come to pay homage, but to also acknowledge the continued labor in response to violence, but through this labor these women also enact promise.”

 

This sentiment echoes through the parks of the Village and wraps around the monuments. The poem encircling On the Day They Come Home, concludes:

I grew up in prison, was raised there. People always said you’re never getting out, the law will never change. We heard that for 24, 35, 40 years... And here we are. Here we are. The impossible is what we do.