by Jeroslyn JoVonn
May 26, 2025
Passionate activists and community members are being tasked with preserving the remaining Black Lives Matter murals.
With an administration pushing back on DEI efforts, it’s taking dedicated activists and community members to protect the remaining Black Lives Matter murals.
According to Urban Art Mapping, a public street art database, nearly 150 “Black Lives Matter” murals still stand. Behind each one is the commitment of local communities working together to preserve the artwork and keep the message of social justice alive.
“Even as BLM Plaza is dismantled, the reciprocal mirroring of these murals ensures their persistence now also reflecting the absence of spaces that have been removed,” Lindsey Owen, an art historian in Chicago, told ABC News.
She pointed to the iconic “BLACK LIVES MATTER” mural painted in bold yellow letters just a block from the White House, widely credited with sparking the nationwide wave of BLM street art in 2020 following the deaths of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, and Ahmaud Arbery during Trump’s first term. The 35-foot-tall letters symbolized protest and solidarity, but the mural was removed in March by order of Washington, D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser, following pressure from the Republican-led Congress.
Nationwide, efforts continue to preserve the remaining Black Lives Matter murals. In Hartford, a BLM mural on Trinity Street, just steps from the Capitol and featuring each letter painted by a different artist, stands as a symbol of resilience. After being defaced with a swastika, the mural was repainted in 2023, reflecting the community’s commitment to protecting its message.
“It was placed with intention,” said Andre Rochester, the artist who painted one of the Ts in 2020 and 2023. “It makes a loud statement that the City of Hartford cares.”
In Chicago, a 100-foot “Black Lives Matter” mural in Oak Park was defaced to read “All Lives Matter,” but the original message was later restored. Meanwhile, in Seattle’s Capitol Hill, a permanent BLM mural is maintained annually by the city and the Vivid Matter Collective, a local artists’ group. A second mural was added outside Seattle City Hall in 2021, and the collective plans to repaint it this June.
Tyrone Motley, who painted the letter “V” during the 2023 restoration of Hartford’s BLM mural, emphasized the importance of preserving the artwork locally, especially as similar murals across the country continue to vanish.
“I feel work like this is ageless,” Motley said. “I’m pretty sure in 10 years people can look at a piece like this and still get the message.”
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