The Traveler

Issue date: 4/25/08 Section: Life & Style

Media Credit: Irina Feofanova Tom Block, a human rights artist, exhibits his artworks from April 14 - May 7 in the Anne Kittrell Art Gallery. In the picture: painting "Afghan Woman Shedding Burka."

Human rights artist Tom Block is exhibiting "The Human Rights Painting Project" in the Anne Kittrell Art Gallery until May 2. The exhibit is a collaboration effort between the Student Anti-Genocide Coalition and the UA Amnesty International, who have coordinated events for Human Rights Awareness week.

The project is a portrait collection that draws attention to prominent figures, controversies and events in the human rights movement.

"My Human Rights Painting Project highlights the struggle for human rights the world over - and the important work the Amnesty International does in working towards this goal," Block said in his artist statement. "Using a contemporary artistic voice, I interpret different aspects of the struggle for human rights, emphasizing the stories that bring it to life. The works themselves capture the range of emotions experienced in this battle. Fear, destitution and pain, as well as hope, joy and even sanguinity form themselves in these faces."

The oil paintings get up close and personal with the subjects, and many are accompanied with a biography.

"Afghan Woman Shedding Burka" gives viewers a peek at what can be considered taboo or witness to a powerful political statement. It features a barefaced woman with dark hair in the center of the painting, surrounded by her fully veiled sistren who is painted without eyes.

There are many stories on the gallery walls. Some immediately relay the horrors passed, such as "Manoj Singh" who cries out while showing an amputated left hand. Others depict candid expressions of the resilient who have suffered personal tragedies, but fought back.

The slightly distorted "Sowore Omoyele" is an image of the man who was forced to watch his cousin raped, his mother and half brothers tortured and molested, and whose Nigerian village was ransacked by military police at the age of 10, according to www.humanrightspaintingproject.com. He later became a Democracy activist, speaking out against corrupt government while emphasizing the dire needs and human rights of Nigerian people, according to the Web site that holds his quote, "If you want justice, you have to fight for it."

Inauguration for the paintings took place at the AFL-CIO headquarters in Washington, D.C., in April of 2002, according to Block's Web site.

Block's other works include "Response to Machiavelli," "Mythology of the Mundane" and "Origins of Life," which can all be viewed from his Web site, www.tomblock.com.

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