Minnesota-based artist and activist Ricardo Levins Morales plants seeds for social change with posters and prints.
In the late 1990s, when a group of postal workers in Connecticut found themselves betrayed by management, they turned to Morales for help.
“Someone from the union called me up,” Morales said. “We had created a T-shirt design in our little catalog – this was before the internet – that showed a row of fluffy little bunnies, and it said ‘Bosses, beware: when we’re screwed, we multiply.”
The workers had been assured that if their bulk mail center closed, replacement jobs would be provided within a 60-mile radius. But when management announced the closure, they failed to deliver on their promise.
The union representative urgently asked, “How quickly can you rush us 300 of those shirts?” Morales said. Soon, 300 postal workers donned the shirts to work as a collective statement against their employer’s broken promises. The reaction from management was swift: a letter declaring that the shirts violated their “zero tolerance for violence” policy.
“Bunnies,” Morales chuckled, recalling the absurdity of the situation. But the workers didn’t back down. They called Morales again, this time requesting 300 more shirts, featuring only the bunnies, without any text, along with 300 buttons. The back-and-forth continued until management conceded, allowing the workers to wear whatever they wanted and securing jobs for all the affected employees within the promised radius.
“The point here is not that this art was so brilliant,” Morales said. “But it’s about the right medicine. It’s like an acupuncture needle – if you put it in the right place at the right time, it releases a lot more energy than it takes to put the needle there.”
This story is just one of many that illustrates the profound impact of Morales’ art, which he describes as a form of medicine to support healing and resistance against oppression. From his early days growing up in the Western mountains of Maricao, Puerto Rico, where the natural world was his playground, to his teenage years in Chicago immersed in the social activism of the 1960s, Morales’ journey has always been intertwined with the struggles of marginalized communities.
His work with the postal workers in Connecticut was just one chapter in a long career dedicated to empowering others through art. In 1976, he moved to Minnesota, where he co-founded the Northland Poster Collective. For more than three decades, the collective worked alongside activists, organizers, unions, and grassroots movements, using art as a tool to inspire action and build resilience.
“We produced custom screen printing and created art about the history of different movements and taught workshops about how to use art in organizing,” Morales said. “We started out not even thinking in terms of being a business, we were just a group of young radical artists doing work for people’s struggles.”
Morales likens his approach to art to a medical practice, where he enters marginalized communities and listens to their concerns to determine the best treatment.
“In medicine, you don’t go in there with a set idea of what’s needed; you listen,” Morales said. “You talk to people, you find out the story people are telling themselves. The goal of an organizer is to shift that narrative to one where the workers have recognized their own ability and right to change things.”
Morales’ commitment to social justice issues, from labor rights and Indigenous environmental movements to racial equity and criminal justice reform, earned him the $100,000 McKnight Distinguished Artist Award from the McKnight Foundation, which was announced this morning.
“Ricardo is an incredible leader and organizer whose art and activism help us envision and achieve a more just and abundant future,” said Tonya Allen, president of the McKnight Foundation, in a press release. “Over decades, his iconic art and generous spirit have inspired solidarity with farmers, environmentalists, union leaders, racial justice advocates, and others working to build movements, strengthen communities and advance justice.”
Morales acknowledges that the award brings visibility, which he hopes will benefit his art studio and storefront in Minneapolis, a sanctuary for creativity and activism offering everything from posters and buttons to zines that provide lessons in organizing. He also leads workshops on creative organizing and sustainable activism, sharing his knowledge and experience with the next generation of activists.
“I’m an organizer at heart,” Morales said. “And art is one of the tools that I use to try to change the world for the better and support people’s emotional and collective immune systems, and that’s what I’m going to keep doing but with some more resources at my disposal.”
For Morales, the true impact of the award lies in its potential to support long term change.
“I prefer to do preventative medicine and long-term environmental shifts rather than emergency intervention,” he said. “Anytime I have resources, I think ‘well, what can we do that will have an impact in changing the future, not just putting band-aids on what’s hurting now? It’s that balance between eating your seed corn because you’re hungry and planting it so that there will be future harvests. There’s too much emphasis on immediacy and not enough on what I call ‘planting the tree someday we want to live under.’”
Looking ahead, Morales has several projects in the works, including a 2025 liberation calendar and a new book set for release later this year that weaves together personal stories, historical insights and ecological knowledge.
“Don’t wait too long before actually putting out your art into the churning waters of the community,” Morales said, offering advice to emerging artists and activists. “The community is going to tell you if you’ve got it wrong. You’re definitely going to hear about it. Nobody’s going to trash you for it but you get to learn how to do it better and better.”
In a world that continues to grapple with social injustice, Morales’ art and recognition from the McKnight Foundation serves as a reminder that, like the bunnies on the T-shirts, when people come together, they can multiply their strength and effect real change.
“I don’t judge how wide something spreads as a marker of success because if a medicine is only significant to a small number of people and those people embrace it and use it, then that’s a win, right?” Morales said. “My goal always is when I create a piece of art, I want people to see themselves in it.”