GA : How does our culture justify buying toy guns for children ? Yes , it ’ s a powerful advertising , marketing culture we are fighting . But we as individuals are the ones that still buy it , wrap it , and gift it to a child . Why are we doing that ?
DW : These were all things I went crazy about with the project because I tried to understand why . I have no idea . Sadly , how it started in this country is when we played “ Cowboys and Indians ” and we took an ‘ other ’ to have power over them , which I think is a really sad root of playing with toys and imagination .
GA : What sets your work apart , which I am sympathetic towards , is the commentary it makes about children , particularly our girls . When we talk about this larger beast of women and gun violence , its effect on little girls is largely absent from the conversation . I see Gun Love and I see you working to ensure that we bring the violence done to girls into this conversation .
DW : That was a very important launching point for me . The television show 20 / 20 did this great special episode where they talk about little girls , guns and the NRA . It ’ s a sick world of trying to get children enraptured with pretty guns in bright colors .
GA : The irony here is that the marketing is more and more directed to these young girls , but the violence they ’ re fighting back with these guns is male violence — rape , intimate partner violence , domestic violence . In other words , men are marketing guns to women to protect them from men . Here is another example where women , not men , are held responsible for male violence .
DW : When you pick up these gun magazines and you find the ads that are targeted towards women , oftentimes it ’ s a man lurking behind a woman ’ s shoulder or she ’ s in her house . It ’ s being directly marketed toward that [ male violence ], which is really fascinating , that the general population can ’ t see through the problem . Men are telling you that you need your gun because of male violence . . . and at the same time , we ’ re going to make a couple bucks off you to protect yourself .
GA : Many of artists in The Gun Issue have experience with gun violence and so their artmaking and activism come from a deeply personal place of trauma . I read that you didn ’ t have this particular experience although you grew up in a hunting culture in rural Maryland . But a lot of our artists have , either they lived in heavilyviolenced neighborhoods or someone they loved was the victim of gun violence and that ’ s how they came to take on this issue . What I appreciate about your point of entry into this subject is that you didn ’ t need a personal experience with gun violence to be passionate about using your artistic practice towards engaging it .
DW : Not at all . I feel very fortunate that I haven ’ t . I think that ’ s because I have a very empathetic connection to those who have . As I was reading those stories , I don ’ t need to have those experiences to imagine what that pain must be like .
This interview has been edited and condensed .
Grace Aneiza Ali is the founder and editorial director of OF NOTE Magazine . She is also a faculty member in the Department of Art Public Policy , Tisch School of the Arts , New York University .
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