Where once the bold yellow letters of Black Lives Matter shone brightly on the asphalt of 16th Street in the US capital, there are now SUVs. The lettering was removed in March after Republicans in Congress threatened to cut off federal funding to Washington.
Keyonna Jones, one of the artists who painted the letters, told DW that this did not lessen the impact of what became known as Black Lives Matter Plaza. “It feels just as powerful being removed,” she said. “A mix of feelings: gratitude, overwhelmed, disappointed, but empowered because, yeah, art does things.”
Keyonna Jones was one of the artists who painted the words Black Lives Matter on 16th Street in Washington D.C.Image: Aline Spanting/DW She and other artists had started painting the huge letters almost five years ago in the middle of the night. At dawn, when strangers stopped to help, they realized that she had become part of something bigger, something with a global impact.
Jones told DW she was “grateful to be one of seven artists that helped paint the mural that actually got replicated all over the world within 24 hours after we did it.”
She said this gave her strength: “That’s how change happens.”
People cried when the Black Lives Matter letters were removed in Washington D.C. in March 2025Image: Jacquelyn Martin/AP Photo/picture alliance ‘I can’t breathe’ The change that Jones wanted, and still does, was justice and equality. It is five years since the African American man George Floyd was murdered in the US city of Minneapolis after being stopped by police. A white police officer knelt on his back and neck for over nine minutes, asphyxiating him. As he was dying, Floyd repeated the words “I can’t breathe.”
The murder was captured on camera and the video soon went viral. Immediately, people went onto the streets to demonstrate against police violence in the US and to call for major reforms.
With millions of people participating, Black Lives Matter (BLM) became one of the biggest protest movements in US history.
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