Category Archives: Black & White & Other Colors

Charlotte Lewis: A Fine African American Artist

Charlotte Lewis (1934-1999)

An artist, activist, teacher and tireless community worker, Charlotte LaVerne Graves Lewis was born on May 1, 1934 in Prescott, Arizona to Lillian and Charles Graves. In 1937, the family moved to Portland, where Charlotte grew up, showing artistic and academic precocity at an early age. After graduating from the Portland Art Museum School in 1955, she pursued a career as a graphic designer, then lived in San Francisco and Philadelphia for several years before returning permanently to Portland.

[It was while she was living on a communal far west of Philadelphia that I (Chuck Fager) met Charlotte, in 1977. Her art work immediately impressed me, and it was then mostly in a style very different, almost pointillist. Later, when I was able to (i.e., working fulltime), I commissioned Charlotte to do a number of illustrations for me and for some of my writings. Her work was always striking and distinctive. Three examples are below.]

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Catching Up With The Saga of TigerSwan, Standing Rock & My Blog

One of the points of the blog post, which I hope will not be lost in the euphoria after the Standing Rock victory, is that TigerSwan exemplifies a state-of-the-art approach to technological control and suppression of organized dissent which has been taking form and growing under the radar over the past fifteen years. (Some details are in the disappeared post.)

It is one I believe we will see more of. And one which will get, I strongly expect, much more support from the new occupant of the White House than the current one.

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