Sitting down with David Ramsey, owner of Deep Roots Experience, a Black-owned and operated art gallery at 7901 Central Avenue in Fairfax, Cleveland, who also has a second location (Wood and Green, 2905 Mayfield Road, Cleveland Heights) that he just opened. Ramsey talks about working only with Black and Brown artists, creating space for the artwork, and presenting artwork in a way that befits the culture.

jimi izrael:

Talk about the politics of Cleveland’s art community.

David Ramsey:

So in the creation of Higher Art, which is the nonprofit arm of the work, we educate young people in art; and then Deep Roots and Wood and Green, it was never our goal to be a part of the institution of art as it exists in Cleveland. We recognized that that institution had created systematical barriers for our art to be represented. They had been regularly and consistently unfair to our artists. Instead of wanting to be at that table, we just decided to build our own table.

jimi izrael:

You’re doing Deep Roots as an off-shoot of your nonprofit, the Higher Arts joint, correct?

David Ramsey:

Yeah, so Higher Art exists as a nonprofit that we started to do art education for teens and young people. As Higher Arts, we did an installation at Progressive Insurance’s corporate office, and then a mural at St. Luke’s Episcopal Church on the West Side. And, of course, we have a mural up in Brewnuts now. We’ve worked with well over 200 children independent of any formal setting—we recruit out of the neighborhood, from the streets, and through parents. What we learned very quickly in some of the work in the detention centers was that we didn’t have anywhere to tell those kids to go once they were released. Art is a powerful tool for education for rehabilitation. Once they leave that system, if you don’t have anything for them to plug into, then they find themselves right back in the same scenarios. So we went to task looking for space.

jimi izrael:

What kind of challenges have you faced? You can’t tell me that you haven’t faced a few.

David Ramsey:

A lot of it has been people not understanding what it is that we’re doing.

jimi izrael:

What do you mean?

David Ramsey:

For example, we work exclusively with Black and Brown artists, right? When I say Black and Brown artists, I do not mean people of color. I mean very intentionally Black and Brown artists. So artists of African descent and who exist in the LatinX community. The reason is because these two cultures are some of the most marginalized. They are, within Cleveland, some of the most troubled and poverty-stricken, and they also happen to be some of the most creative humans on this damn planet. You don’t hear about these artists.

jimi izrael:

What is the Black art aesthetic? I think in our community, we’re too used to seeing dead people on t-shirts and calling it art, and I can’t entirely agree.

David Ramsey:

I’ll start by saying that if you live a life that doesn’t have a significant amount of difficulty to it, then you are uniquely equipped to present pieces of work and expressions of yourself that reflect that. Again, America’s model has allowed for a more relaxed, comfortable experience to exist with one group of people and a much more difficult, dark experience to live with another.

jimi izrael:(annoyed)

Who are we telling the story to and for? Are we telling it to and for the edification of white people, or future generations?

David Ramsey:(long pause)

Yes.

jimi izrael:(laughs)

Fair enough.

David Ramsey:

We tell that story for us, so that we can make sure that our narrative is told in a way that is accurate to what our experience is. We tell that story to other cultures because they deserve to understand what the Black experience is, the same way we understand what the Asian experience is and we understand what the Latin experience is, and we understand what the Irish experience is. St. Patrick’s Day is one of the biggest commercial holidays in America, and we struggle to get people to respect Martin Luther King Day or Black History Month. We got to start using a different lens while we’re looking at the experience of Black people. We have gotten so docile in our acceptance of people just doing whatever they want to our community and to our culture and to our things.

It’s happened musically. You look at jazz, you look at rock, you look at hip hop. All artistic expressions that were spearheaded by people of color, by Black and Brown people, that are now dominated by people that don’t look like us. We too often let people into our culture and give them the space to help shape that culture. We need to start taking a more aggressive and more intentional grasp of the stories that we live, and the stories we tell, and be willing to sacrifice just a little bit so that we can make sure that that story is told accurately. I would suggest that some of the influx and support that Black Americans find in other countries is part and parcel to our intentionality in making sure that we tell our story in a way that we feel comfortable with.

An institution that lives off of your back is not going to tell people that they’ve been whipping it.

jimi izrael:

Okay. You’re a curator, but you’re also a dealer. How’s business?

David Ramsey:

Business is successful. It has allowed us to maintain our space, which is of course the most important thing. We’re able to continue to operate. We get more and more eyes every time we do a show, which leads to more and more collectors and also leads to more and more critics. I am as accepting of critiques of the art experience as I am of my personal work. I’m looking for people to give us feedback. If your feedback is about the culture, then that’s not something I’m always going to accept because if you don’t understand the culture or you’re not a part of it, then you don’t really get the nuances of why we make certain choices. But if you come into the space, and you see a piece of art, and you challenge me on whether it is of the same quality as some of the other artwork, or you challenge me on whether the message fits with the rest of the pieces, those are conversations that I’m always willing to have.

jimi izrael:

Name three things you need to know to make yourself a successful entrepreneur in the arts.

David Ramsey:

Who your audience is, what your purpose is, and what your message is.

jimi izrael:

I’m going to go out on a limb and maybe suggest that you don’t get a ton of white traffic in that store.

David Ramsey:

You’d be surprised.

jimi izrael:

I wouldn’t be.

David Ramsey:

Every show we get more and more, and I think it is a testament to the quality of work that we have. I’m a firm believer in that if the shit is good, it’s going get found. Whether that’s music, paintings, golfers, basketball players, whatever. It’s a basketball player right now, in some rural city in Alabama who’s got D1 schools coming to his house to recruit him, because greatness is visible to whoever is looking. So as we do more shows, we get more and more traffic of people outside of the diaspora, but it is difficult because the experience of enjoying art has been historically whitewashed. It is a very Eurocentric and very white-themed experience, and we do things differently here. We do it based on the experiences of our culture.

We celebrate differently, and every time that we have a show that opens, it’s a celebration because it’s a testament to the greatness that exists within us that we’ve been able to put up on these walls for other people to see.

jimi izrael:

Wow, okay. That’s damn near a t-shirt.

David Ramsey:

Yeah, we got some t-shirts if you want some.

I know we’re talking like we’re wrapping up, but if I can real quick, Deep Roots and Wood and Green are the two art galleries that I own, and I’m very proud of them, but there are a ton of Black and Brown art spaces that are popping up throughout the city. You have the one at 78th Street Studio. Shout out to Angelique, a young Black woman who is the co-owner of that space. You’ve got Antoine Washington and Mike who have the Museum of Creative Human Arts, which is [in Lakewood]. You got The Cleveland Gallery. You got Sammy, who is operating out of Blank Canvas. You’ve got Framed. There are a ton of these spaces that exist that really have not been given the notoriety or the looks that they should.

Part of my work is not just about building ourselves up, but making sure that it’s understood that we thrive as a community. So I wanted to make sure I got those people’s names on here because they have some amazing work.

jimi izrael:

So what does 2021 look like?

David Ramsey:

Yeah man, we got a ton of shows coming up. We’re doing our SheArt exhibition in July, which is the exhibition that we do every year. It is dedicated to Black and Brown women, so the only people who are showing during that time are Black and Brown women. All of the events around the exhibition are focused on Black and Brown women. The only invitation that I offer to men is to sponsor Black and Brown women to participate in the programs. So we got that coming up. We’re doing the Best in Black wine competition again this year. We’ve connected with some really dope wineries that’ll be participating this year that didn’t get a chance to last year. We’re working on a concept called Boxed Brunch. In this time of COVID where we can give the feel of a brunch party with the safety of some COVID-friendly experiences.

Yeah, and then just continuing to Curate the Culture. We’re expanding, doing some stuff in other states, curating some shows outside of Ohio, and continuing to grow the brand. That’s really it, man, just living this art life as honestly and fluently as I can. We will be working off of the theme of Black excellence throughout the entire year. So please pull up, have a good time with us.