0:00:15.316,0:00:17.500
I come from a background in which

0:00:17.500,0:00:22.221
I never experienced any male members[br]of my family cry.

0:00:28.938,0:00:33.131
That inability to express any level of emotionality

0:00:33.131,0:00:35.839
was something that I started to question.

0:00:39.208,0:00:42.225
It doesn't allow for weakness nor vulnerability.

0:00:46.845,0:00:49.831
Art became a pathway for me--

0:00:51.230,0:00:54.860
a way in which I could experience these vulnerabilities

0:00:54.860,0:00:59.117
and wear them,[br]and share them to an immediate audience.

0:01:01.660,0:01:05.453
[Shaun Leonardo: The Freedom to Move]

0:01:07.508,0:01:09.047
[PLAY-BY-PLAY ANNOUNCER][br]--The quarterback scrambles out,

0:01:09.047,0:01:12.079
--throws a pass that almost gets picked off[br]by Shaun Leonardo.

0:01:13.223,0:01:17.340
[LEONARDO] I played football for[br]over ten years of my life.

0:01:17.340,0:01:18.933
[PLAY-BY-PLAY ANNOUNCER][br]--Leonardo, defensive back playing linebacker.

0:01:18.933,0:01:21.079
LEONARDO:[br]All of my work stems from that experience,

0:01:21.079,0:01:23.950
of a dual identity between artist and athlete.

0:01:26.069,0:01:28.590
I can recall as if it were yesterday,

0:01:28.590,0:01:33.439
a coach that I actually love and I have[br]fond memories of,

0:01:33.439,0:01:36.869
says to me, as a way to enrage me,

0:01:36.869,0:01:40.831
says, "I want to you play like they just let[br]you out of Riker's."

0:01:46.107,0:01:49.125
As a young man--[br]I'm 21 at the time--

0:01:49.761,0:01:52.179
you don't have the wherewithal or the tools

0:01:52.179,0:01:55.020
to absorb that in any healthy manner.

0:01:55.020,0:01:56.560
And so, what happens?

0:01:56.560,0:01:58.079
It works.

0:01:58.079,0:02:01.469
I actually do bring out the rage[br]that he was looking for.

0:02:01.469,0:02:03.846
[PLAY-BY-PLAY ANNOUNCER][br]--Leonardo is able to push him inside and tackle him.

0:02:03.846,0:02:07.454
--Great play by Shaun Leonardo[br]with the game-saving tackle there.

0:02:08.810,0:02:11.400
LEONARDO:[br]I'm now 40 years old

0:02:11.400,0:02:13.728
and I'm still thinking about that moment.

0:02:15.360,0:02:18.650
When you are marked by your difference,

0:02:18.650,0:02:21.780
by your color, by your perceived identity,

0:02:21.780,0:02:25.641
you become this hyper-visible target.

0:02:27.781,0:02:32.610
It's in that hyper-visibility that actually[br]you become invisible,

0:02:32.610,0:02:34.854
because people see right through you.

0:02:34.854,0:02:37.354
--Are you ready!?[br]--Yeah!

0:02:47.569,0:02:49.400
After college,

0:02:49.400,0:02:51.300
post my football career,

0:02:51.639,0:02:54.540
I showed up in a Mexican wrestling mask

0:02:54.540,0:02:56.705
and fought an invisible opponent.

0:03:00.000,0:03:01.256
[FIGHT BELL RINGS]

0:03:02.602,0:03:04.154
[AUDIENCE CHEERING]

0:03:04.853,0:03:07.557
["El Conquistador Vs. The Invisible Man," 2006]

0:03:08.731,0:03:11.140
With each match, it was important that

0:03:11.140,0:03:14.667
the audience was left with Shaun Leonardo--

0:03:15.769,0:03:18.409
that the character was stripped

0:03:18.409,0:03:21.519
and that you were left with the person[br]that felt the need

0:03:21.519,0:03:23.900
to go through this struggle

0:03:23.900,0:03:26.225
in order to see himself.

0:03:29.488,0:03:32.173
Can you imagine,[br]there's no one in front of me.

0:03:33.190,0:03:36.527
And so, even if something as little as a punch,

0:03:37.269,0:03:40.530
you could register it just like this.

0:03:40.530,0:03:44.650
Or if you're in the audience, what's actually[br]going to be legible?

0:03:44.650,0:03:45.650
I have to be able to...

0:03:45.650,0:03:46.790
[SOUND OF FIST HITTING OPEN PALM]

0:03:46.790,0:03:49.799
I have to be able to really dramatize it[br]in such a way

0:03:49.799,0:03:51.409
that you foresee it coming

0:03:51.409,0:03:54.407
and then you see it follow through.

0:03:58.793,0:04:01.749
I was offering the spectacle of violence

0:04:01.749,0:04:05.489
and that identity of hyper-masculinity[br]and aggression

0:04:05.489,0:04:10.225
that is so often anticipated[br]from a Black body.

0:04:13.340,0:04:18.049
And this notion that,[br]as a Black and Brown body,

0:04:18.049,0:04:21.250
we move through the world and serve as a mirror

0:04:21.250,0:04:24.098
for White people's projections.

0:04:25.000,0:04:27.027
[AUDIENCE CHEERS]

0:04:27.430,0:04:28.323
--One!

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--Two!

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--Three!

0:04:30.000,0:04:31.986
[AUDIENCE CHEERS]

0:04:35.191,0:04:38.123
["Self-Portrait," 2010]

0:04:40.358,0:04:46.631
And then discovering and learning[br]and finding ways to distort that image,

0:04:48.390,0:04:53.373
to portray and feel deeply a fuller self

0:04:54.030,0:04:58.926
that is not contained within these projections[br]or these stereotypes.

0:05:02.253,0:05:04.540
That has been my mandate.

0:05:04.540,0:05:10.090
That has been the very thing that I want[br]to offer to the world.

0:05:13.375,0:05:17.575
--Can anyone describe what was happening in[br]their bodies?

0:05:17.575,0:05:19.611
[MAN][br]--Very, very uncomfortable for me.

0:05:19.611,0:05:21.287
--Like I feel my body getting hot.

0:05:23.660,0:05:28.300
I wanted to pull more and more people[br]into that exploration

0:05:28.300,0:05:32.122
so that it would not be contained[br]to my own narrative.

0:05:33.203,0:05:38.414
It was through this strategy of physical embodiment[br]that I could pull people into it.

0:05:40.130,0:05:43.814
I wanted people to feel it[br]and to allow their bodies

0:05:43.814,0:05:46.713
to say what the piece needed to be.

0:05:49.129,0:05:50.344
["Primitive Games," 2018]

0:05:50.895,0:05:52.979
[AUDIENCE APPLAUSE]

0:05:56.624,0:05:57.759
--Participants!

0:05:58.797,0:05:59.784
--Ready!

0:06:03.111,0:06:04.173
--Bring it!

0:06:05.954,0:06:08.164
[DRUMMING ECHOES THROUGHOUT ROTUNDA]

0:06:17.430,0:06:18.898
--Left, yes; right, no.

0:06:19.640,0:06:23.073
--Do you feel American?

0:06:27.459,0:06:31.000
I really wanted to see if,

0:06:31.000,0:06:35.855
by dialing into our experiences of confrontation,[br]of conflict,

0:06:36.660,0:06:41.140
we could sense some sort of truth[br]in another person's body,

0:06:41.140,0:06:44.430
and therefore question our perceptions of[br]how we initially read

0:06:44.430,0:06:45.923
an other.

0:06:50.564,0:06:52.580
[BRASS BAND PLAYS A FUNERAL MARCH]

0:06:52.580,0:06:54.847
["The Eulogy," 2017]

0:06:59.466,0:07:02.568
--What are you waiting for me to tell you?

0:07:05.397,0:07:09.479
--His name was Trayvon Martin[br][BAND STRIKES]

0:07:09.479,0:07:11.267
--and he was unarmed.

0:07:14.700,0:07:18.754
When I saw the image of Trayvon Martin[br]on the news,

0:07:19.220,0:07:22.120
so much of my own experience of fear,

0:07:22.629,0:07:25.610
and the ways that I was being perceived out[br]in the world,

0:07:25.610,0:07:27.080
all came rushing to the surface--

0:07:27.080,0:07:29.411
things that I clearly had buried.

0:07:32.377,0:07:35.964
As a young Brown kid growing up in Queens,

0:07:35.964,0:07:40.378
I also started thinking about all the young[br]brothers that I'd left behind.

0:07:41.522,0:07:44.780
Then asking, "Well, why me?"

0:07:44.780,0:07:47.590
Why was I the one that was able[br]to make it out?

0:07:47.950,0:07:50.210
To go to a good school,

0:07:50.210,0:07:52.060
to pursue an MFA,

0:07:52.060,0:07:54.330
to live according to my passion.

0:07:56.428,0:07:58.580
It's taken me a long time to understand

0:07:58.580,0:08:03.680
that I simply want more people in the world[br]that look like me

0:08:03.680,0:08:06.250
to be able to move through the world[br]with that kind of

0:08:07.080,0:08:08.080
freedom.

0:08:08.652,0:08:12.591
--Okay, what we're going to do is just walk.

0:08:14.117,0:08:16.746
--Walk naturally.

0:08:18.166,0:08:21.069
--Take up as much space as possible.

0:08:21.620,0:08:24.110
--Walk your walk.

0:08:24.110,0:08:29.779
[In 2017, Shaun co-founded "Assembly," a criminal justice[br]diversion program at the arts non-profit Recess.]

0:08:31.347,0:08:38.189
[Youth charged with misdemeanor offenses and criminal[br]possession of a weapon participate as alternative sentencing.]

0:08:39.264,0:08:44.038
We move through what I started to describe[br]as a visual storytelling curriculum.

0:08:45.000,0:08:48.419
What we do is sculpt the scene of that story

0:08:48.419,0:08:50.360
or of that memory.

0:08:50.360,0:08:57.690
So the storyteller is allowed to look at their[br]story through a very different set of eyes.

0:08:58.474,0:09:04.031
They start to gather more meaning as to how[br]that narrative is of an individual

0:09:04.031,0:09:07.682
and not some preconceived notion of criminality.

0:09:08.127,0:09:10.541
[MAN][br]--If he runs, we all got to run.

0:09:12.660,0:09:16.380
I've had to really deal with[br]the philosophical crisis

0:09:16.380,0:09:20.760
of what it means to be enacting[br]an art space program

0:09:20.760,0:09:25.930
that I believe has freedom as its central[br]value and goal,

0:09:25.930,0:09:27.510
and yet,

0:09:27.510,0:09:31.913
still operating in something that is really[br]a criminal justice space.

0:09:35.748,0:09:39.460
["Mirror/Echo/Tilt," 2019[br]Collaboration with Melanie Crean and Sable Elyse Smith]

0:09:39.460,0:09:41.630
The only thing that I've arrived at,

0:09:41.630,0:09:44.330
which keeps me in the work,

0:09:44.330,0:09:48.686
is the personal change that I can sense[br]in these individuals--

0:09:50.530,0:09:54.421
in these young people that are[br]the young people I grew up with.

0:09:57.685,0:10:00.370
I always return to the same thing:

0:10:00.370,0:10:04.690
the art is the very thing that has power[br]in this space

0:10:04.690,0:10:06.460
because it is unfixed.

0:10:07.117,0:10:09.132
It cannot be defined.

0:10:13.900,0:10:19.020
By being able to really exist[br]in your own body

0:10:19.020,0:10:24.894
and understand that you do not need to be[br]defined by an experience--

0:10:25.360,0:10:27.865
in this case, arrest and incarceration--

0:10:30.238,0:10:35.941
it allows you to move forward with[br]a little more sense of joy;

0:10:37.276,0:10:40.605
what Ta-Nehisi Coates describes as[br]"the beautiful struggle."

0:10:42.544,0:10:45.260
It's by being in your full self

0:10:45.260,0:10:47.483
and attempting to live,

0:10:47.907,0:10:50.000
that can never be taken away.

0:10:51.170,0:10:56.252
To get anyone to start imagining possibilities[br]for themselves again,

0:10:57.163,0:11:00.000
that is what we all should be after.