Following a chance meeting ten years ago that quickly blossomed into a close friendship, Marc Bertel and Rudy Drayton Jr. have been developing a series of artworks aimed at transcending the reductionist rhetoric of race and class and challenging the all too common negative representations of life in South Central Los Angeles. 

Having been welcomed into the midst of the Drayton family and being accepted as one of their own was the fertile ground of the various long-term projects. Continuously permeating their shared lives, these projects require everyone to take time for one another, to give space and - particularly on Marc's part - to listen. For having the Draytons' trust and support doesn't automatically negate the possibility of inflicting (economic) harm on them. How, then, is it possible to establish an art practice that doesn't mirror the prevalent social and economic system of oppression and extraction that the art market profits from? How can artworks featuring Marc’s adopted family and friends in Watts be created without exploiting a culture that is not his own, echoing rap duo Clipse's lyrics "my ghetto's not your culture"? And, most importantly, what can be given back that is of value to the Draytons, that is representative of the love and care Marc has received from them? 

These questions, among others, provide the theoretical framework for the films, publications and interventions. At their core lies the belief in art as a creative device to foster and activate communal bonds and to embrace and build upon our differences, unimpaired by the specter of race and class. As Édouard Glissant proposed, “to meet each other squarely is to acknowledge our difference.”