West Side residents gathered in large numbers Aug. 31 to celebrate artistic talent and global Black cultures at The People’s Convention: The African Fest Out West.
The event was hosted by the Kehrein Center for the Arts (KCA), 5628 W. Washington Blvd., in collaboration with The Black Panther’s Annual People’s Convention.
Reesheda Graham-Washington, executive director of the Kehrein Center, said the partnership supports tenets shared by both organizations, including inspiring civic engagement.
It is also a way, she said, to tie together other opportunities for community engagement for residents of Austin. One example of this would be U.S. Rep. Danny K. Davis’s Back to School picnic and parade, which was scheduled for the same day.
“We have been able to work together to combine a few different events that are happening in Austin … which makes room and invites Austin to celebrate its own self as a community all day long,” Graham-Washington said. “So, us partnering together to host both of our events at the KCA on the same day allows us to bolster community engagement and community participation in ways that we are really excited about.”
Among the events scheduled for the festival included a commemorative birthday celebration of Fred Hampton, Sr., the civil rights leader who served as deputy chairman of the Illinois chapter of the Black Panther Party. While he was deputy chairman, Hampton coordinated several community service projects to address racial injustices in Chicago. He was shot and killed by Chicago police officers during a raid on his West Side apartment on Dec. 4, 1969.
Additional opportunities included a conversation with Chairman Fred Hampton, Jr., and a screening of Judas and The Black Messiah. The People’s Convention also hosted multiple vendors whose products included food, essential oils, African clothing, African art, jewelry, accessories and more. Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson, an Austin resident, spoke to the event’s attendees and participated in a Q and A where questions were drawn from residents in Austin.
The planning and initiatives taken to successfully organize the festival were due to a collaboration of community leaders, Graham-Washington said.
“This has really been a grassroots-organized curation of activities and programing, where local artists, local artisans, local civic leaders have come together and contributed in the best ways that they could for this all to come together in one event,” Graham-Washington said. “I think that is the way that the programming at the KCA should be, and we’ve just really been a support and a beacon to shed light on the work that is always already happening in the neighborhood of Austin.”
The African Fest Out West is part of longtime South Side tradition called the African Festival for the Arts, which is usually located in Washington Park. The program began in 1995 and has turned into a four-day celebration that focuses on highlighting the voices of Black artists and their work.
Earlier this summer, Patrick Saingbey Woodtor, CEO of African International House USA and founder of the African Festival of the Arts, released a statement which announced that the festival would be postponed citing increased production costs.
“Over the past few years, especially during the COVID-19 pandemic, we have faced numerous challenges that have impacted our ability to host the festival to the high standard we strive for,” Woodtor said in a press release. “This postponement will allow us the necessary time to evaluate and return to a stronger position to deliver an even better festival.”
Despite the African Fest Out West being scheduled for one day instead of four, there are current initiatives to increase more civic engagement opportunities in Austin. Graham-Washington says that conversations are already ongoing for additional collaboration for another large event hosted by the Annual People’s Convention in December.
“We are already in some preliminary conversations about how we can connect with [the Annual People’s Convention] to bolster and uplift that programming as well,” Graham-Washington said.