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1 min read

Dōgon: The New Culinary Hotspot Opening at Luxury Hotel, Salamander DC

Dōgon, the eagerly awaited restaurant from renowned chef Kwame Onwuachi, is set to open at Salamander Washington DC on September 9, 2024. This collaboration reunites Onwuachi with Sheila Johnson, founder and CEO of Salamander Hotels & Resorts, the largest Black-owned luxury hotel collection in the U.S.

Inspired by Benjamin Banneker, the Black astronomer and cartographer who helped survey the original borders of the District of Columbia, Dōgon will feature a menu that blends flavors from Nigeria, Jamaica, Trinidad, and Creole cuisine—a tribute to Banneker’s African heritage.

Chef Onwuachi’s return to the DMV has generated significant excitement among food enthusiasts. Known for his vibrant Afro-Caribbean cuisine, Dōgon promises to deliver a unique and unforgettable dining experience.

The restaurant’s interior design will enhance this experience, offering a modern aesthetic infused with traditional African motifs, creating a warm and inviting atmosphere.

As Dōgon prepares to welcome guests, it is poised to become a culinary landmark in the nation’s capital, attracting both food lovers and locals with its innovative menu, talented chef, and stylish ambiance.

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2 mins read

‘Defund The Police’ Painted on DC Street Near ‘Black Lives Matter’ Mural

On Saturday, as thousands gathered in the nation’s capital, protesters painted “defund the police” in large yellow letters Saturday on 16th Street NW in Washington, two blocks north of the White House. The letters are painted in a similar font and color as the “Black Lives Matter” mural unveiled earlier this week on the same street.

On Sunday, D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser declined to say whether those words would be removed from the mural, which was painted Friday on a stretch of 16th Street NW in front of the White House.

Bowser said on ABC’s “This Week” that she was proud of the mural: “It is an affirmative piece of art, a centering piece of art where people from around the globe have called us and thanked us for acknowledging black humanity and black lives in the most important city in the world.”

Co-anchor Martha Raddatz asked, “But will you take out the part that says defund police?”

“Well, it’s not a part of the mural, and we certainly encourage expression, but we are using the city streets for city art,” Bowser said….“I actually haven’t even had an opportunity to review it, …but we — the response that we’ve gotten from people about the black lives matter … mural has just been incredible.”

The Black Lives Matter D.C. chapter called the gestures “performative,” accusing Bowser of trying to distract from “her active counter-organizing to our demands,” which include reducing the city’s police budget and reinvesting the funds elsewhere.

On Saturday, negative comments were spray-painted on or near it, such as “This ‘Mural’ Ain’t Doing Shit.”

defund the police

 

-Tony O. Lawson

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1 min read

D.C. Mayor Renames Street in front of the White House “Black Lives Matter Plaza”

D.C. Mayor Muriel E. Bowser renamed the street in front of the White House “Black Lives Matter Plaza” on Friday and emblazoned the slogan in massive yellow letters on the road.

The actions are meant to honor demonstrators who are urging changes in police practices after the killing in police custody of George Floyd in Minneapolis, city officials said.

They come after several days of the mayor’s strong objections to the escalation of federal law enforcement and a military response to days of protests and unrest in the nation’s capital. Local artists and others joined city work crews to paint the giant slogan, starting around 4 a.m.

The art will take up two blocks on 16th Street NW, between K and H streets, an iconic promenade that leads directly north of the White House.

Shortly after 11 a.m., a city worker hung up a “Black Lives Matter Plz NW” sign at the corner of 16th and H streets NW. Bowser watched silently as onlookers cheered and the song “Rise Up” by Audra Day played from speakers.

-Tony O. Lawson

Related: Black Owned Eateries in DC You Should Know


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6 mins read

Historic Black Owned Restaurant Approved for Coronavirus Relief Loan

Ben’s Chili Bowl is a historic Black Owned restaurant restaurant in Washington, D.C. Amid the coronavirus pandemic that has gripped the D.C. region,  the landmark has been doing its best to adapt.

Thankfully, a loan from the Paycheck Protection Program means the U Street institution will get to feed its loyal and hungry patrons for a bit longer.

historic black owned restaurant

Sage Ali, a member of the Ali family that owns the restaurants, said that the business’ bank informed him that the application for the loan was approved for the second round of PPPs. The application did not get in in time for the first round.

A PPP is a Small Business Administration loan that helps businesses keep their workforces employed during the coronavirus outbreak.

“Things are good … and we’re very thankful for that,” Ali said.

They have not received the money, but Ali said that it should cover at least two months of the payroll for the four restaurants that the family owns: the original one and Ben’s Next Door on U Street NW, a location on H Street NE and one in Arlington, Virginia.

Currently, only the original restaurant remains open for takeout and delivery.

Ali said that he would only consider reopening on a case-by-case basis.

He said the personal family commitment has been that the U Street location will never close, “but we really do have to look at the other locations on a case-by-case basis and see.”

Ali said that it’s hard to imagine what the “new normal” means.

“As you know, the Chili Bowl has been a real community gathering place, and we’ve created where the community goes. Even beyond the DMV, it has become a global community gathering place,” Ali said.

But what does social gathering mean after social distancing? That is what Ben’s Chili Bowl and other restaurants and businesses are trying to figure out.

“This would have easily been our biggest year ever” had it not been for the closures, Ali said.

Another Ben’s Chili Bowl location had just opened at the beginning of March at the Horseshoe Casino in Baltimore, but by March 16, the casino closed due to the orders to shutter nonessential businesses.

Loads of tourists were also scheduled to bring in revenue this spring and summer with the cherry blossoms and summer vacation, and bookings that were scheduled months in advance all the way to September were canceled.

“It changes the whole game, and we have to look up and say, ‘How do we adapt to this?’” Ali said.

However, even with over 80% of the business down, Ali said people have been very supportive.

When news hit that the restaurant was in danger of closing because it did not get a loan during the first round, people started coming in, ordering more online. One person even bought a $500 gift card.

Ali said while he and the family were very thankful, it was a little bit uncomfortable.

“We’ve never asked for money,” Ali said. “We’re so thankful with what we’ve been given by the city that our job is to give back and to support and to bring something to the community,” and he said they did not really feel right accepting the man’s generosity.

So, they turned it around, using the money to feed first responders and those in assisted-living facilities.

“That came as a response to this beautiful outpouring of love. How do we pay that forward? How do we use that to enhance our ability to give back?” Ali said.

So now, when people buy gift cards, Ben’s Chili Bowl is taking that and reusing it to buy food that will be donated to first responders.

“We’re not saying, ‘Hey please come and help us,’” Ali said. “We’re thankful for people to come, and if you want a meal, come and get a good meal. Come get a friendly face. That’s what we do. That’s what we’re here for. We’ve always been here for you, so we’re trying to give more than we receive. That’s what we’re here for,” Ali said.

For more information on purchasing a gift card or ordering a chili dog, go to Ben’s Chili Bowl website.

You can also find out more about how to help the restaurant feed first responders on the Ben’s Chili Bowl Foundation.

 

10 mins read

Inside Cane, The D.C. Restaurant With Street Food From Trinidad

Bellying up to a metal table inside his new kitchen on H Street NE, Peter Prime lowers a long-reach lighter into a hole in a hand-held smoker and watches as it sucks the flame into a mixture of beech wood and coconut husks.

Peter Prime and his sister Jeanine Prime (Credit: City paper)

Smoke winds through a black tube inserted through a crack in the lid of a boxy plastic container, perfuming an ice cream base he’s made out of a milk he’s extracted from Dominican coconuts — the baby Thai ones are too inconsistent for his taste. Prime yanks the hose out of the box after a minute. The coconut milk has a lot of fat in it, he says, which will take on the smoke quickly.

Cane chef-owner Peter Prime is using Dominican coconuts to make his own coconut milk. Rey Lopez/Eater D.C.

Cane, Prime’s first restaurant venture as an owner, will open on Monday, April 22, at 403 H Street NE. He’s spent the past few weeks workshopping dishes that will replicate the street food he grew up eating on the island of Trinidad, a cuisine heavily impacted by enslaved people from Africa who worked the sugar cane fields and indentured workers from India who arrived during British rule.

The enthusiastic response Prime received for the Caribbean smokehouse style he developed at Spark at Old Engine 12 in Bloomingdale convinced him that D.C. was ready for him to further explore his roots. After training at the French Culinary Institute in New York and working with some of Washington’s most successful chefs — Michel Richard at Citronelle, Rob Weland at Poste Modern Brasserie, Todd Gray at Equinox — Prime has a toolbox of techniques to lean on while creating his version of food found largely on street corners and rum shops.

“We don’t have a huge eating out culture,” Prime says of Trinidad, “but food is central to all of our lives.”

At Cane, a soft-serve machine will pump out smoked coconut ice cream with a benne seed candy, and flavors like Guinness beer and rum raisin will rotate in for adults.

Appetizers will include doubles, a ubiquitous street food snack often eaten for breakfast. Prime compares them to tacos, except instead of a tortilla there is a frybread wrapper stuffed with curried chickpeas and a spicy relish. On the wall, there’s a painting that recreates a photograph of former President Barack Obama eating one during a state visit.

Prime served the frybreads at Spark, which closed its restaurant and became a full-time private events space in December, but they were deconstructed and served with different condiments. At Cane, they come on paper just like they do on the street in Trinidad.

Prime’s jerk chicken wings, the first Caribbean dish he experimented with selling, will also make the trip over from Spark. Grilled oxtails and brisket sliders will also be familiar to Prime followers, but the latter will come on hops bread, soft rolls he’ll be pulling fresh out of the oven every day for happy hour. Prime is continuing his whole snapper, too, deep-fried and tossed with pickled peppers.

Chef Peter Prime’s famous jerk wings. Tierney Plumb/Eater DC

Tiffin boxes, stackable sets of metal containers popular in India, will have containers for the Trinidadian paratha — or roti bread — and compartments for beef or duck curries and vegetables.

“It’s kind of designed as a great appetizer for four or a meal for two,” Prime says.

Rich, fatty plates follow the tradition of rum shop dishes called “cutters” because they cut through the alcohol. That includes a cow heel soup and a geera (cumin) pork stew. At rum shops, Prime says, people usually get a bowl of ice and a bottle of rum to share while they casually eat and drink.

“Your palate is kind of being numbed by the straight alcohol,” he says. “The cutters wake it up. You enjoy the food more, and you enjoy the rum more.”

A robust rum program at Cane includes rhum agricole and spirits from heritage stills at Demerara in Guyana. Customers will be able to sample rum flights, and a fresh juice program forms the base of cocktails. That includes a sweet lime juice that goes into Prime’s rum punch and mauby, a sweet and bitter concoction made from steeping a Caribbean bark.

To recreate the feel of the rum shops back home, Prime enlisted the help of his sister, Jeanine Prime, who partnered with him to open Cane. Jeanine, who holds a Ph.D. in social psychology as well as an MBA, remembers watching Julia Child on TV with her brother and their mother.

“It’s been a dream for a long time to open this thing,” she says. “Maybe back in 2006 we were kind of dreaming about going into business together.”

Distressed wood lining the bottom of the bar, in the host stand, and in the painted shutters on the wall help mimic the vibe of lean-tos serving rum on the beach. More polished wood — on the seats of chairs, on the floors, in tabletops and banquettes — reinforces the feeling.

The showpiece is a textured white wall that’s made out of a composite formed from recycled sugar cane.

Jeanine Prime says she’s most excited to eat her brother’s oxtails, a staple from their childhood. Peter Prime has had to coach his butcher to cut them the right way so every customer gets a tiny, exposed pocket of bone marrow. Another dish she’s looking forward to eating is the pepper pot, a rich stew that has both pork and cow heel.

“Pepper pot we have every Christmas for breakfast actually, a bowl of meat,” she says while laughing.

Both siblings say they were never excited about cooking home food when they were younger. They didn’t appreciate it until it wasn’t a regular part of their lives anymore.

Peter Prime says his path of coming full circle may feel a little cliche. But once he started experimenting with Caribbean food, it had a powerful impact on him. It made him remember where he came from, how he was shocked when he was scolded by a culinary school instructor for dousing a roasted chicken with black pepper because he was raised to love spice.

“The light kind of flickered and came on, and it was just like, this is what I do,” Prime says. “This is how you bring soul to your food.”

At a time when Washington is seeing an influx of island food through the prism of white vacationers — recent openings include the island-hopping Coconut Club in Union Market and Tiki TNT at the Wharf — Cane’s Afro-Caribbean chef authors a love letter to the daily sustenance of the diverse people of Trinidad.

Prime doesn’t have a chip on his shoulder anymore. He’s not trying to show every French technique in his arsenal. He’s just trying to put his story on a plate.

“In a place like D.C. with so much going on in the food scene, I feel like for your contribution to be relevant, it has to be from somewhere real,” he says, “somewhere you can bring a unique perspective.”

 

 

Source: Eater DC

9 mins read

Ben’s Chili Bowl Inspires D.C.’s Black Business Owners to Invest in Themselves

Virginia Ali, cofounder and owner of Ben’s Chili Bowl, says the iconic 60-year-old business would have folded a long time ago if she and her late husband, Ben Ali, didn’t have the foresight to buy the building on U Street NW.

Today in Washington, Ben’s stands out as a shining example of a black-owned business that’s stood the test of time. Last month, a group of entrepreneurs organized DMV Black Restaurant Week to bring together young restaurant and bar owners looking to follow the Alis’ example. DMV Black Restaurant Week guided attendees to more than 30 participating black-owned restaurants, including Ben’s Chili Bowl, Ben’s Next Door, and Ben’s Upstairs.

Virginia Ali says that the original Ben’s, the landmark home of D.C.’s signature chili-slathered half-smoke sausages, only survived because the she and her husband had invested in themselves instead of renting from someone else. At workshops and events throughout DMV Black Restaurant Week, her message resounded among a new generation of young business owners.

“I’m absolutely, positively sure it made the difference as to whether we could stay or not stay,” says Ali, who turns 85 next week.

In the late ‘80s and early ‘90s, the crack cocaine epidemic had decimated Washington, and Ali said business was practically nonexistent. According to an article in the Washingtonian this year, things had gotten so bad around Ben’s that the matriarch invited police to raid her shop when drug dealers were making sales from inside the restaurant’s booths.

Owning the building outright meant that even though generating revenue was a struggle, the Alis didn’t have to worry about paying a mortgage. Once the Metro station was built nearby, higher rents pushed out many longtime residents and businesses, but Ben’s was able to increase its value. Now the building is a major asset that’s been passed down within the family. Ben’s Chili Bowl opened in 1958 in a building bought for around $65,000. According to D.C. public records, it’s worth more than $2 million today.

In that way, the Alis have established intergenerational wealth. Teaching others to do the same was one of the major topics of discussion during DMV Black Restaurant Week.

Andra “A.J.” Johnson, a property investor and restaurant consultant who helped organize DMVBRW, says acquiring intergenerational wealth is particularly tough in the black community. According to a 2016 study by the Urban Institute, white households in D.C. had an average net worth 81 times greater than black households, and black-owned properties were valued significantly lower than white-owned ones.

DMV Black Restaurant Week founders, from left, Furard Tate, Andra “AJ” Johnson, and Erinn Tucker.

“How many people of color can walk up to their family and say, ‘This is what I need?” Johnson said. “It’s a problem. But it shouldn’t affect how much our growth is.”

For Johnson, building intergenerational wealth in the restaurant industry starts with a change in mindset — instead of grinding to make someone else’s dreams come true, members of the black community should save and invest in themselves early like the Alis did. “We need to get off somebody else’s race,” Johnson says. “We need to be on our own racetrack.”

Johnson brought up hosting a panel on the topic of intergenerational wealth with fellow DMVBRW founders Furard Tate and Erinn Tucker while they planned the weeklong celebration. A conference featuring that panel was a resource for people who want to someday own restaurants. The founders of DMV Black Restaurant Week consider it to be a success. They’re now working on planning quarterly events, including panels and an awards ceremony honoring black hospitality leaders.

“This is a continuing conversation,” Tate said.

Attendees in November learned it’s not enough to solely focus on getting capital to start a business. It’s also critical to secure proper permits and licenses, create a business plan and structure, decide who will inherit the business, and find available city resources and loans.

“If you don’t know about it … you don’t have the opportunity compared to other places that have it,” Tucker said.

Tate, a chef and entrepreneur, knows firsthand that property ownership is crucial to achieving intergenerational wealth. In 2014, he was forced to close his 18-year-old restaurant, Inspire BBQ, after his landlord sold the property on H Street NE to a developer. Tate wishes he’d followed the Alis’ example.

“They were their own landlord, so when times got hard, they were able to weather the storm,” Tate said.

D.C. Institution Ben’s Chili Bowl Holds 60th Anniversary Party
Virginia Ali, center, is escorted by activist Jesse Jackson at the 60th birthday party for Ben’s Chili Bowl in August 2018.
Half-smokes on the flat top at Ben’s Chili Bowl.

The Alis opened Ben’s Chili Bowl when D.C. was still segregated. They envisioned it as a business to not only serve the community on U Street, then known as Black Broadway, but as an asset for their unborn children. Ben Ali gave their three sons Ben as a middle name in case they went into the family business.

The couple’s sons, Nizam, Kamal, and Haidar, also known as Sage, now run Ben’s Chili Bowl. They’ve opened more locations at Nationals Park, FedEx Field, Reagan National Airport, and on H Street NE. They also opened full-service restaurants, Ben’s Next Door and Ben’s Upstairs, that serve avocado toast, steak frites, and crab cakes.

Tony Simpson, who appeared on the DMV Black Restaurant Week panel on intergenerational wealth, has found success running two businesses in predominantly black Prince George’s County. He and his wife, Josette, own SoBe Restaurant & Lounge, a Lanham, Maryland, restaurant slinging American fusion cuisine with a swanky South Beach vibe.

Before opening SoBe, Simpson didn’t know much about restaurants. But he knew plenty about scrimping and saving. He recalls eating tuna fish sandwiches and driving a beat-up car before he got his IT Services company, CHRONOS Systems, off the ground in Suitland, Maryland.

With money from that venture, Simpson financed SoBe himself. Not everyone has that luxury, but with planning and sacrifice, Simpson set the course for the next generation — his 30-year-old son Brandon now manages SoBe and owns a clothing company.

“If you plan to have that for your family going forward, you must start planning for those grandkids and those people that you want to pass it onto in the beginning of your career,” Tony Simpson says.

Virginia Ali hopes her three grandchildren eventually take over the growing Ben’s franchise, already inviting them in to get a taste of the business at the U Street landmark that advertises Chili Smokes and Chili Burgers on its facade.

“It’s a great way to meet people and to learn how to deal with folks from all walks of life and all cultures,” she said. “I find it fun, and I think they do too.” 

SiriusXM Host Joe Madison Honors The Life And Legacy Of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., With A Live Broadcast From Ben’s Chili Bowl In Washington, DC

Source: Eater Washington D.C.

11 mins read

The steady decline of African-American culture in Washington DC

Under five-foot-tall Virginia Ali, white-haired and frail, welcomes the never-ending stream of customers entering her diner. The 84-year-old woman is the owner of Ben’s Chili Bowl, one of the most famous restaurants in Washington DC (District of Columbia). Opened 60 years ago, on U Street in Northwest Washington, it is one of the last vestiges of the heyday of African-American culture in the city.

“When I arrived in Washington in 1952, I realised how prominent and classy the Black community was. We had our own banks, Howard University, two state-of-the-art movie houses, without mentioning all the businesses, doctors, lawyers and architects we had,” Virginia recalls.

Once known as “Black Broadway”, with its many Black-owned businesses and nightclubs, U Street was the cultural and economic hub of the city’s African-American community, until the riots that broke out following the assassination of Martin Luther King in 1968. Sacked by rioters, the neighbourhood was left abandoned, only to be taken over by gangs and crack dealers in the 1980s.

Until then, the US capital, home to famous African-American leaders such as abolitionist Frederick Douglass and Mary McLeod Bethune – an educator and advisor to President Roosevelt – had been at the forefront of the fight for civil rights. Already in 1830, 35 years before the abolition of slavery, the majority of the city’s Black population was already free. Washington was also the first city to give African-Americans the right to vote, in 1867, three years before the rest of the country, and to abolish segregation, one year before the historic Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka Supreme Court decision declaring segregation in public schools to be unconstitutional.

U Street is now considerably gentrified. Several period buildings have been demolished to make way for luxury apartments and trendy stores, designed for, more often than not, the city’s white newcomers. The less fortunate Black residents, meanwhile, are often forced out by the rising rents. Ben’s Chili Bowl is one of only three Black-owned businesses in the area to have stood the test of time.

A few blocks from there, in the Shaw neighborhood, the recently renovated Howard Theater has been one of the Black community’s most popular cultural hotspots since it was built in 1910. Louis Armstrong, Ella Fitzgerald, Duke Ellington, Billie Holiday, James Brown, Aretha Franklin – almost all the legendary African-American musicians have performed at this venue.

“Look at this photo. This is me playing at the Howard Theater,” says Jimi Smooth, an African-American musician from DC. During his teenage years, this now 72-year-old man used to work as an usher at the famous entertainment hall.

“Howard Theater was a real cultural phenomenon. We didn’t have many places to go, and Howard Theater kept the community together. People would come to see their idols,” explains Smooth.

Like many other symbols of the city’s African-American culture, the Howard Theater, vandalized during the 1968 riots, was also left neglected until a private group took over its management in 2006.

“The theater is the shadow of what it was in the 70s…money changes everything. If you don’t have money, you have to step back. That’s why gentrification brought the decline of Black culture in DC,” he adds.

Go-go music: the rise and fall

In addition to the legendary figures of the African-American music scene born in the city, such as Marvin Gaye and Duke Ellington, Washington is also the birthplace of go-go music. Created in the 1970s, this subgenre of funk with a strong African influence was the pride of Washington’s Black community during the bleakest decades in the capital.

The music bands at the time found themselves having to compete with DJs who didn’t need to stop between songs. Chuck Brown, known as the ‘Godfather of Go-Go’, therefore decided to extend the percussion solos during the interludes to keep people on the dance floor.

Chuck Brown

“Music is the soundtrack of a community. It is its voice. Go-go was for us and by us. We could claim this for ourselves in DC. It was ours,” says Kato Hammond, an African-American musician and journalist, considered to be go-go’s de facto historian.

Like many other African-American cultural riches, go-go also fell victim to the upsurge in violence and crime in the capital during the 1980s. The city, plagued by a crack epidemic at the time, came to be known as the “murder capital” of the United States. The venues of the go-go bands, very popular amongst young people, became the stage of disputes between rival gangs.

“Violence definitely contributed to the decline of go-go music. When two neighbourhoods had a fight going on, they knew where to find the rival crew because everybody would go to the go-go. So the police targeted venues where go-go bands played, to stop the violence,” recalls Hammond.

Gentrification and identity crisis

Weakened by years of economic recession, at the end of the 1990s, the city council launched a plan to revitalise Washington and its poor neighbourhoods by attracting several billion dollars in property development projects. The result: 52 per cent of the city’s poor neighborhoods have been gentrified since the year 2000, according to a study by Governing magazine.

“The U Street NW and H Street NE corridors have gone upscale, pushing out the places where you could buy tickets, hear go-go music live and purchase your neighbourhood’s unique brand of embroidered sweats,” wrote Natalie Hopkinson, journalist and author of the book Go-Go Live: The Musical Life and Death of a Chocolate City, in an article published in the Washington Post, on 11 April 2010.

Credit: David Baron on Flickr

Albert Hillman has been cutting the hair of people from his community for 50 years in his small business on H Street, in the northeast of the capital. Photos of Mohammed Ali, Martin Luther King, Nelson Mandela and Malcom X on the walls of the small barbershop stand as a reminder of the African-American heritage of this neighbourhood, where businesses like Hillman’s are an increasing rarity.

“I receive phone calls from developers who want to buy the building every day. They are offering me US$1 million. Gentrification is good because it brings work, but a lot of people have been forced to leave because of the rent rises,” says the barber, holding up a property brochure.

Grocery stores, funeral parlors, beauty salons, and barbershops are among the many Black-owned businesses shut down as a result of the neighborhood’s gentrification. According to the Urban Institute, which conducts research into political, social and economic policies, almost 68,000 new residents came to live in Washington between 2000 and 2010; 50,000 of them were white. Millennials aged between 18 and 34 accounted for 35 percent of the city’s population, as compared with 23 percent for the rest of the country.

For Brandi T. Summers, this is part of the reason for the decline of African-American culture in the city.

“Everyday culture means cultivating Black life, Black owned businesses, small supermarkets opened and owned by Black people, professors and artists, political decisions that keep Black people thriving, access to education and employment, as opposed to laws that tend to be disproportionally against Black people and lead to poverty, incarceration and disenfranchisement; everything that made Washington great for the people who lived here, even when the rest of the country saw it as a terrible place,” she explains.

It is in a bid to stop his community from suffering the same fate that artist and cultural activist Vernard Gray decided to set up a website to register and feature local Black artists from the deprived neighborhood on the east of the Anacostia River, an area of the capital known for its poverty and high crime and shooting rates. Artist, curator, art collector, Vernard Gray has been fighting since the 1960s to preserve African-American culture in Washington. In 1976, he opened the Miya gallery, an art space dedicated to promoting African-American art, which he directed until its closure in 2001.

“My project is intended to expose those artists and the fact that they reside east of the river. Hopefully, as they get exposed, people will do more business with them,” explains Gray. ”I saw a real estate listing that described the area as ‘up and coming’, which is code for ‘opportunity and affordable’ for people to come and take it over. Developers rename places and claim it as something else, as if nothing had happened.”

By Andréane Williams for Equality Times

This story has been translated from French.