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George Floyd’s dying words on a Minneapolis street have become a lament for the nation. They appear in this carved panel, mixed-media piece by Carl Dixon as the text for what he calls a “sermon in wood” about the many ways people are struggling to breathe free in these troubled times. Beginning with an image of Floyd with the restraining knee of a police officer on his neck, the Mississippi folk artist shows sign-carrying protesters choking from tear gas and a COVID-19 patient on a ventilator. The masked angels in heaven send the message that covering your face saves lives.

Signs of welcome, hope, and refuge—that’s what Jewish trans artist Micah Bazant creates: posters and images for public spaces that make a claim on them as welcoming. Bazant’s images claim the public libraries, community centers, religious organizations, and urban storefronts where they’re placed as spaces of shared responsibility for engaging and truly seeing others. The welcome and advocacy of Bazant’s posters are far-reaching, with images and text around Black Lives Matter, disability justice, indigenous rights, trans justice, and environmental justice.