OUR STORY

Project Attica was started by Anthony Posada in 2010 after he experienced the combined impact of the 25-year incarceration of his father and his personal experience with the discriminatory Broken Windows policing of the New York City Police Department. As a proactive response to the criminalization of his family and the over-policing of his neighborhood,  Anthony started making social justice themed t-shirts that intentionally challenged viewers into questioning mass incarceration, gun violence, racism, oppression, police brutality, xenophobia, and overall discrimination in our society.

The idea of activism and art transformed into a formal arts-based organization devoted to working with underserved youth in order to teach them how they could use art to take a stand against the issues they felt passionate about. This is how the artivist workshop combined with social justice education took root.  Since then, Project Attica has grown into a collective of advocates, activists, community members and artists dedicated to spreading the message of using art to uplift peace, unity, strength and love.

We have two main goals: first, we seek to raise public awareness about the status of marginalized youth and the crisis of mass incarceration. Second, we strive to strengthen communities by promoting art projects for underserved youth, combating stereotypes, prejudice, discrimination, and educating residents about their legal rights.  

In the past, Project Attica has led workshops on mass incarceration at Hunter School for Social work, collaborated with New York City Cure Violence organizations on art programs, shared the program internationally and we have also presented numerous times at community centers and high schools on social justice issues using art as an educational tool.  Since 2011 we have focused on Artivism workshops and Know your rights presentations mainly at New York City high schools, successfully encouraging students to discuss social justice issues related to the criminal justice system and beyond.