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For the most impactful voices in Black culture, art and activism have never been separate. This conversation brings together artists who put their careers, their comfort, and their platforms on the line for something bigger than themselves. They've used creativity as a tool for resistance and storytelling as a form of power.
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00:01Essence Festival 2026, how are y'all doing today? It's the final day. Make sure y'all keep y'all
00:06energy high.
00:07My name is Oakley Jones. I am the senior entertainment editor here for Essence Magazine, and we have an amazing,
00:13amazing conversation for you guys today.
00:15Art has always been a catalyst for change.
00:18Today, Lene Vene and Kendrick Sampson will explore how storytelling, entertainment, and activism can inspire communities, challenge systems, and empower
00:28the next generation to take action.
00:30Please welcome Lene Vene and Kendrick Sampson.
00:53How y'all doing this morning?
00:56Good, how are you?
00:57I'm good, I'm good. I think you're the first and only woman we've had on the panel all weekend.
01:02Wow, how nice is that?
01:04Yes, thank you.
01:05Thanks for having me.
01:06Of course, of course.
01:09So, Kendrick, I wanted to start with you, my brother.
01:11You've been visible at protests and community events, as you have on television as well, too, man.
01:16Why is it important for you to go beyond posting online and actually organize on the ground?
01:24I mean, yeah, I'm waking up.
01:28So, honestly, my filter ain't there.
01:32I mean, there's no point to organizing online if you're not organizing on the ground.
01:38You know, and I'm not up here presenting myself as an organizer, necessarily.
01:48I'm not saying I'm not, but I'm not up here.
01:52Honestly, my approach is more about storytelling and art than anything else and how effective that is in organizing, to
02:01aid organizing.
02:03And by organizing, I'm just talking about community building, making sure that we're as healthy and powerful as we possibly
02:08can be together.
02:10But, yeah, there's no, it's more, it's like having conversations with no practice, no follow-up, no action, if you're
02:19posting with no, and it's not connected to any action of changing people's behavior or getting more people involved in
02:29whatever cause, whatever the purpose of your campaign is.
02:33Now, Lynnae, you have a very strong social media following, but you're also going on tour as well.
02:38So, how has it been actually seeing and experiencing your impact and being able to see people and see the
02:43things that you've done?
02:44I think seeing people, it always makes me feel better.
02:48It always fills my cup a little bit more because the discourse online can be so discouraging.
02:53And we're fighting through a lot to get messaging out to people.
02:57So, to know that it's reaching people in a way that you're investing information in a way that's being returned
03:02for people who want to come out and see you and share space,
03:04and to your point, like, making sure we're touching and agreeing in a physical aspect and not just parroting talking
03:12points online,
03:13that's always helped propel me to move forward because if I were to just do my work solely online, it
03:20would feel like a, I don't know, yelling into a chasm.
03:25Yeah.
03:26Kendrick.
03:27You work with organizations that focus on criminal justice, policing, and racial equity.
03:32How has spending time in those communities taught you things that people might not know from what they see on
03:36the news, man?
03:39I ain't going to lie to you.
03:41I thought this was about art and activism.
03:43So, this is, you know, half and half.
03:46You know, so hold on.
03:48Let me get this.
03:48Okay.
03:49So, because you didn't prepare me for these things.
03:51You asked that focused on criminal justice, policing, and racial equity.
03:55Yes.
03:56Activism and spending time in those communities taught you.
03:59I think, okay, so, you know, because we in this little living room, and with Bill Power, we call something
04:05called the living room experience, right?
04:07And we like to have conversations like we actually have them in the living room and talk real.
04:13But, and so, exactly.
04:14Okay, you get what I'm saying?
04:16You know what I'm saying?
04:16So, for a second, let's just act like we in the living room.
04:20You know what I'm saying?
04:21And have a good time.
04:22But, and thinking about, like, honestly, what those, to refer back to your question, spending time in the community is
04:31what art is about.
04:32Understanding what our real life experience is and what we do better than any other race.
04:39I, I, I, I'll be, I'ma, I'ma, I'ma talk my shit today, okay?
04:42What black people do, what this melanin does better than any other race, especially in this country, we, no matter
04:51what we're going through, we, it's how we do it.
04:54More than anything, it's not just what we do, because we do what we have to, but it's how we
05:00do it.
05:00How we make it just like the melanin, for some reason, no matter what the situation is, we gonna make
05:06it smell good.
05:06We gonna make it taste good, we gonna make it sound good, we gonna make it feel good, you know
05:10what I'm saying?
05:10Because that's part of our power to get through those hardest times.
05:14That pleasure, that, that, that pleasure that we put on things, the thing, that little stink that we put on
05:19things, that little seasoning that we put on things, make it, makes, makes the experience that much more palatable.
05:27I won't even say palatable, because palatable, sometimes it's, it's, it's just torture to get through this shit.
05:32But it, it regulates our system in a way, it grounds us, um, and connects us in a way that
05:38pushes us through, it makes us that much more powerful together, and we just look good doing it.
05:42You know what I'm saying?
05:43And that is my, that's honestly what, what I love so much about art, and we're taught that art is
05:48just like, an extracurricular thing, like a, like a, like a luxury.
05:52But when you see, Lene is a, is a, it educates folks, like, educates the fuck out of folks, but
06:00what, the way she does it, the way she says it, the way she delivers it, the way she look
06:06when she doing it, you know what I'm saying?
06:09That's, okay, you know what I'm saying?
06:13Thanks.
06:13Come on, tell them how you do it.
06:15No, I mean, I think, I really love what you said when you used the word pleasure, because I think
06:20art is a pleasure, and I know art is a, um, it is a, I'm just waking up too, I
06:26just look better.
06:27Um, art is a medium, it is a pleasurable medium for us to express how things make us feel, and
06:34like our experience.
06:35And also, like you said, it helps, it regulates and grounds us, but when you were saying palatable, I think
06:40it just makes it easy for us to digest and process, to be able to push through it.
06:44And so, you're a storyteller, as am I, like, with my poetry and me really leaning into that, I feel
06:50like there are so many creators who do what I do as far as the education, as far as the
06:54advocacy, as far as, like, being on the ground or whatever, and we all supplement, and that's allowed me to
06:59give more space to the gifts and talents that I'm most passionate about.
07:02But what I really love about poetry as a medium, it really gives me the opportunity to speak to people
07:09here, because I think when we're talking politically, we're speaking to our, our, not just our physical space, but the
07:15external things that impact us from the outside, maybe anxiety-inducing and all the things, but it heals from the
07:20inside.
07:21And so, I think art and activism is so necessary, because it's just the driving force that propels us.
07:28And really, I think you're giving me a new framework, because I've been fighting against the concept of resilience, because
07:33I'm 30 years old, but I grew up in the strong black woman rhetoric era, and that was being pushed
07:39so hard.
07:40And for me, I feel like resilience is a term that dehumanizes us, because it's just this keep going, oh,
07:45we got it.
07:45There's nothing that affects us, and that's not the truth.
07:48We're human beings, and so I just feel like our hope is a much more human aspect to, or a
07:54human element to derive our courage and our sustenance through, but art is the medium that allows us to do
08:01that.
08:04You see what I'm saying? Do you see what I'm saying? Do you see what I'm saying?
08:07So, kind of expounding on the poetry aspect, Lene, how do you choose your themes, and what's your creative process
08:14when you're creating a poem nowadays?
08:16Yeah, I think I try to speak to, I try to take things and turn them on their heads.
08:22Like, what concepts are we regularly talking about, but how do we enter it from a different perspective to give
08:26us some more balance, to give us some more breathing room to discuss it?
08:30I think I also take from, in my endeavor to highlight the humanity of this experience as we're pushing against
08:38fascism and moving through authoritarianism, I think about my personal experience and what I'm feeling most, and I don't push
08:46that to the side because I feel shame for not being my best, because I know that's a real feeling,
08:52that's a common feeling.
08:53So, how do I speak to that in a way that's not, oh, you can just sit down and, like,
08:58you know, you can just, like, I get you feeling like you need to step aside.
09:02No, that's not what I'm saying.
09:03I'm honoring this part of you that is struggling with this, that is the beauty, and you continuing to move
09:09past and through it.
09:10So, I think most of all, what I'm concerned about right now is how people are feeling emotionally and trying
09:15to strengthen that and, like, offer some support, meaningful support, not just platitudes.
09:22And this next question is actually for both of you.
09:24I'm going to start with you, Kendrick.
09:26There's Instagram, Facebook, NBC, all these different mediums, and we're getting so much information nowadays, man.
09:35For someone that wants to get politically aware, what would be the first step that they need to take?
09:39It just seems like it's so much overwhelming information, man.
09:41What would be the first step a person would take when they're trying to build awareness for the political and
09:46social climate?
09:49I mean, one is spending time in the community and talking to each other.
09:55And I don't know, I'm stuck on something Lene is talking about, but I'm doing my best to formulate it
10:02in my head.
10:02That art is where we explore all those gray areas of emotion and conflict.
10:14It's where we work out those problems because art is vulnerable.
10:21It's the most vulnerable.
10:23The artist has, everybody's like, art is so sensitive.
10:26Art is so sensitive.
10:27No, art is actual vulnerability.
10:29It's what are the...
10:31Made tangible.
10:32It made tangible.
10:34It's like, oh, how can I feel that?
10:36How did you express that?
10:37It's the unexplainable explain in storytelling.
10:40It's display.
10:41This is how we're going to do it.
10:42This is our most creative way because it is a great thing to talk about emotions, to talk about who
10:47deserves what, who got what,
10:49what the situations that we constantly run into and can relate to.
10:53How do we get through that?
10:54And we don't have time in life, usually because of the way America is set up.
10:59We don't have time to try to practice that conflict resolution, to talk through those real stories and real situations
11:05that we constantly go through.
11:07There's no systems built.
11:09All the systems are built for profit, not actual healing, not actual empowerment.
11:16And so when we see art, that's what's resonating with me so much that you're talking about is that is
11:22our tool for working those problems out,
11:24for having those conversations in ways that we don't normally get to and giving us scenarios like now we can
11:32refer to the movie,
11:33now we can refer to the song, now we can refer to the poem and say, nah, it's like that.
11:39Remember when you oohed and aahed at that part?
11:42That's what you was doing to me.
11:44You know what I'm saying?
11:44Like you have situations that you could talk through it with.
11:47And that's when I'm thinking about politics, relating directly to politics, a lot of times people say,
11:55there's always this thing of presenting art and activism as like these two completely different things
12:03that somehow folks like me and Lene have figured out how to merge together.
12:09And so we get these questions like, how do you do that?
12:12And the truth is that the whole purpose of art is that we have abused art so much and taken
12:21it outside of that purpose that we don't realize that it's not a unique thing for art to be at
12:28the center of community building.
12:29And so when we're thinking about how to engage people in politics, it's not about which outlet is most trustworthy.
12:37It's about building up your skill to understand and filter out the bullshit and know what the truth is.
12:44And the only way to do that is to have constant communication with the people around you to understand that
12:51everybody deserves to have a healthy life.
12:54And we all have a role to participate in that.
12:57What is your role?
12:58What are all these other people's role?
13:00And how are the government or whoever else disrupting that?
13:03And how do we make sure that they don't disrupt that?
13:05And it boils down to more than ever, especially with social media, we forget that, yes, it's a great tool
13:12to connect across and know what's happening on the other side of the world.
13:15It's incredible.
13:16That's incredible.
13:17But it makes us forget sometimes that the most important thing is local, connecting with people locally, understanding what's needed
13:25locally and how you can take care of it locally, not what you have to ship in or what's happening
13:30across the world.
13:31I think more than anything, understanding not what outlet, but how you communicate with each other and get what you
13:38need and make sure everybody gets what they need is the most important thing in the political framework, political grounding.
13:46Amen.
13:46I'm going to piggyback off this and get back around to your question.
13:49But to the point of what art is for, like it's political capacity.
13:54I think for me, if you're going to ask me how, I always think to the quote or the understanding
14:00that if you want to understand the people or it's time, you look at their art.
14:04And for me, everything that I do, I'm producing art as if like this were a time capsule.
14:08You're going to know exactly what was happening to me politically so you can understand how I was suffering so
14:13it can never happen again.
14:14If someone is going to open my Instagram page or however it looks at 100 years from now, they're going
14:19to be able to understand at least one perspective of a black woman in the United States of America on
14:23the 250th anniversary and how much freedom we did or did not have.
14:27I think to your point, it is so critical.
14:30I think you made an excellent point because I'm so, I'm an academic still and information is very important to
14:36me and making sure people have the right sources of information is important to me.
14:39But I've been thinking so much about how, maybe not y'all, but if I can be frank, everybody's fucking
14:44stupid.
14:45Like nobody reads anymore.
14:47The children are illiterate.
14:49So are their parents.
14:50And people lack such critical thinking skills to be able to even digest complex political thought at this time.
14:57And I swear, I'm not being ableist.
15:00I'm not punching down anyone with a learning disability.
15:03But this country has divested from the intellectual capacity of its population.
15:09And we're seeing that in real time as such misinformation is running rampant.
15:14So I can say things like making sure we're reading hardcover books again, that we're using pen and paper again,
15:20that grandmas and aunties are making their kids write five paragraph essays before they go outside and play.
15:25However, comma, information and context is not always accessible to people.
15:32And so I've been warring with, like, how do we meet in the middle?
15:35How do people make sure, how do we just find space for people to be at least conscientious enough to
15:43be skeptical of information in front of them?
15:45And that is making sure you're engaged on the ground, know what your community needs, and seeing how that's being
15:50disrupted.
15:50And if you can notice those disruption points, then you can say, hey, maybe I should get a second opinion.
15:56Now, on the other side, as far as resources we can trust, we know that big media is being bought
16:00out.
16:00It's very difficult for even information to get to you.
16:04Down in Georgia, we're having a gubernatorial election, and there's this billionaire, Rick Jackson.
16:09He just won the primary for the Republican Party.
16:12But he did that by using his own money to just clog up the airwaves with commercials for these rural
16:20conservatives on these streaming apps or whatever to beat out the Republican proponent that non-MAGA Georgians would have picked.
16:27And I'm saying all that to say citizen journalism is going to be our saving grace right now.
16:35Independent news sources are going to be our saving grace.
16:37Now, you still need that critical thinking and that skepticism in general to be able to cut through some of
16:42those things because some folks, they go look at where the money resides, and they change up their message.
16:49But people that I trust right now is like my boy, Conscious Lee, who just walked up in here.
16:53There's a woman named Elizabeth Booker Square.
16:55She is smart as all get out.
16:58Garrison Hayes, Kenneth Walden, or Too Raw, Too Real.
17:03These are people who are not just influencers, though, y'all.
17:05And you may not be in this space, but because I am one, there are these influencer wars going on
17:11on threads and things like that with people who are outside of it who may not have as large platforms
17:15trying to attack trusted sources.
17:18But we do things outside of influencing, which made us be able to have these big platforms.
17:22Like I have a master's in African American studies.
17:24I'm an educator.
17:27George is a world-class debater and has multiple degrees.
17:30All of us have multiple degrees.
17:32Liz, the person I just mentioned, she's a lawyer.
17:33She's got an MPH, all sorts of things.
17:36Like, we're suited to do this work for you.
17:38I'll say Kasim Reed on Substack as well.
17:41George, anybody else I'm missing?
17:43If we're looking for sources?
17:48Facts in Five.
17:49Blair Imani, Smarter in Seconds.
17:51Ashley the Baroness.
17:52There are so many black creators with trusted voices who are skilled to do this work that you can.
17:58Christina Brown, there's so many people.
18:00But, again, and we come in groups.
18:02We come in groups.
18:03You see people get upset sometimes when we make these dancing videos and we tag our friends if it's having
18:08a good time.
18:08But that's also showing you who we're in community with and who we trust.
18:11So we're finding, again, it's not what we do.
18:14It's how we do it.
18:15We put a sauce on everything.
18:17Like, some things we got to be able to do underneath the table and not be so fucking obvious about.
18:21But if I'm doing this TikTok trend with this girl, you say, okay, let me go follow her and see
18:24what she's talking about, too.
18:26That's it.
18:30Now, I didn't go to college.
18:32But I do learn from all of them.
18:36And I'll be taking notes and things.
18:38And I take really good notes.
18:41But one thing that I want to piggyback on that you said to go back to writing and the practice
18:48of actually writing as opposed to typing and then we were talking about the purpose of art and how it
18:58helps us sort out those gray areas.
19:02I was told by my therapist, writing physically is the only thing that connects the right and the left brain.
19:10You have your logical side and then you have your imaginative, you know, this side, right, the creative side.
19:18And drawing, not typing, drawing, because writing is drawing.
19:24You're actually doing your, that is your art, how you do it.
19:28You're drawing and organizing your thoughts at the same time.
19:33That's the connective tissue.
19:35That is a skill that we all need.
19:39That is a skill that we're all losing.
19:43And it has to be practiced.
19:46And so I think that that's a, there's no, I don't want to underpin that point.
19:51But in any, I want to make sure I overemphasize that point.
19:56That's why I was clapping.
19:57I'm up here on, on a panel talking about.
20:01Because like for real, for real, it seems like there's all these complicated solutions.
20:07Going and talking to these, the, the influencers are, are following them and getting the local organizations, information from local
20:16organizations.
20:16That, that can happen all day.
20:18But if we're not practicing building those skills, we're not going to improve.
20:23We're not going to change behavior.
20:24We're not going to have the effect and the transformation that we really should have.
20:28So we do have to make sure that we're putting extra emphasis on gathering together in person, connecting in person,
20:35practicing that connection, that conflict resolution.
20:37And things like writing and how we're doing, how we're displaying the information, how we're getting through things.
20:44So both of you are public figures as well, too.
20:46And I'm thinking about your content and your art and the things that you put out.
20:50Is there a pressure that you guys feel to always kind of put out the right thing, you know, since
20:55you're seen as leaders in the community?
20:58Yes.
20:59It's a yes or no question.
21:00The answer is yes.
21:02But it goes back to what I was saying earlier.
21:06And I'm not saying that I'm smarter than anybody.
21:08Like, I think.
21:09But you are.
21:11Okay.
21:11There are people in the world.
21:12Absolutely.
21:12I'm smarter than anybody.
21:13I'm just saying that when you do this work long enough, and I'll speak for myself, I've been doing this
21:21so long, I've almost run out of things to say.
21:25And I've been aware of a certain level of aware of political engagement and how this affects the black experience
21:33for a certain amount of time to where my conversations are not so surface level anymore or maybe, like, reflect
21:41the dominance of it.
21:42And I'm not so much of a certain amount of emotion.
21:43I'll use this as an example.
21:45I'll use this as an example.
21:45And I'm prefaced this by saying I'm going to vote for her in this gubernatorial election.
21:50There's a woman named Keisha Lance-Blobbs running for governor.
21:52She could be the first black governor in Georgia.
21:54She was not my pick for the primary.
21:57And I expressed that given specific things that happened in Georgia's history.
22:01There was a more progressive candidate that folks weren't giving a chance because she had a certain amount of name
22:05recognition.
22:06And we are in Georgia.
22:07Georgia is not Atlanta.
22:09A lot of the rural South's dominant emotion, we know her.
22:14So we should vote for her.
22:16And I'm using that as an example to say I've been doing this too long for that to be my
22:20baseline.
22:21Me personally.
22:22And so sometimes when I speak to points that are a little bit more complex than that, I rub my
22:27audience the wrong way because they think I'm just an op or I'm not supporting this person.
22:31When it becomes much more than that, so I try my best.
22:36The only person I'm responsible to is God when I do my work.
22:39But I try my best not to hurt anybody and to try to make people feel seen.
22:43But also I think my mission right now on this earth and this era is to help change people's minds
22:49and the way we show up.
22:51Not just their actions but their minds, their mindsets about how much we can access.
22:55So, I mean, I often bristle audiences nowadays because that desire to think critically has not reached a lot of
23:03audiences yet.
23:05Yeah, I definitely feel pressure to get it right just because that's the purpose.
23:09The purpose is to correct things.
23:10The purpose is to get it right, for us to get it right together.
23:14The purpose is to build the platform to the point that if you get it wrong, that everyone will correct
23:20you quickly in a way that you know is effective for you and your audience, right?
23:25There's accountability to that, but I think I'm much less, because I know my intention and the work that I'm
23:39doing and how I'm held accountable for the most part, I'm less anxious about getting it right.
23:47I'm more anxious about getting it wrong, but I'm not like, I'm not necessarily, basically I'm a, I said what
23:58I said type nigga.
24:00Okay.
24:01If I've done my research, if I've done what I said, I said what I said, I said, even if
24:06I got it wrong, I said what I said.
24:11Come on, you know what it is, you know what I'm saying?
24:15If I said what I said, I got it wrong.
24:17Did I get it wrong?
24:18Yeah, I got it wrong.
24:21But you know what else, dude?
24:23I think a willingness to just acknowledge when you get it wrong and even apologize, I feel like that goes
24:29so much more of a long way when it comes to building trust and integrity with your audience.
24:33And I've never understood people being unwilling to say a past version of myself was less informed and just didn't
24:39get it right or had less care for my audience.
24:42I just feel like right now we don't have time for ego.
24:45So I've gotten things wrong all the time.
24:47But most of the time, if it's something that I can pin a comment, I'll say thank you for the
24:51correction.
24:51Here's the information for everybody to see because it's not about me being right.
24:55It's about you being informed.
24:58Ladies and gentlemen, Ms. Lenevenet, Mr. Kendrick Sampson.
25:04You hate that.
25:05Thank y'all.
25:06Thank y'all so much.
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