The Art of Protest

Community collaboration in the face of injustice. Using art to voice dissent to systemic issues in our communities. The path to creating a piece of protest art destined for the Smithsonian. Through a multi-disciplinary design practice, De Andrea Nichols helps change makers nationwide address social, civic, and racial equity challenges within their communities. De serves as Director & Principal Designer of Civic Creatives, a social design organization that produces interactive events, tools, and services that foster the discovery, ideation, prototyping, and actualization of community-driven civic solutions. As an arts-based activist, Nichols organizes communities to develop creative calls-to-action for social justice issues through her leadership with the Artivists STL collective, Citizen Artists STL, and FoodSpark. Nichols also serves as a Board of Directors member for Forward through Ferguson and chairs the Board of Directors for Creative Reaction Lab. She is a national keynote speaker on the subjects of designing for civil rights and social justice, and she is a 2016 recipient of the St. Louis Visionary Award for community impact in the arts. Most recently, De was selected as a 2017 Citizen Artist Fellow for the John F. Kennedy Center in Washington, DC.