36 x 18 in. acrylic on canvas

The Evolution Will Not Be Televised … An Analysis and Tribute to Gil Scott-Heron operates within the Black Arts Movement and spoken-word lineage, where language functions as a weapon, a warning, and a call to consciousness. In this tradition, the work confronts television and mass media as ideological machinery—systems that frame reality, neutralize dissent, and render Black struggle consumable while stripping it of urgency and truth. The viewer is positioned not as an audience member, but as a participant, compelled to question what tell-lie-vision delivers as information, entertainment, and fact.

Emerging from a lineage that rejected assimilation into dominant cultural narratives, the work distinguishes between revolution and evolution. To revolve is to remain trapped within a controlled cycle of spectacle and reaction. To evolve is to rupture that cycle—to move forward with intention, memory, and resistance. In the spirit of Gil Scott-Heron and the Black Arts Movement’s insistence that liberation is lived, spoken, and enacted—not broadcast—this work refuses repetition. It advances. It evolves.