Cranston artist goes all out to save democracy

Jeneane Lunn is a buzz saw of a human being, or maybe one of those Catherine wheel fireworks that spins around and around, hurling sparks in all directions.

That’s because she’s involved in nearly every aspect of the No Kings 3 march and rally being planned for March 28 at the Rhode Island State House.

She brings a lot to the table. “I am pretty organized. I hate to sit still,” says Lunn, 70, a painter and art teacher in Cranston. “I am a pretty good nudge and tend to come up with some OK ideas and then implement them.”

She’s not kidding.

Within hours of the January murders of two protestors in Minnesota by ICE agents, she had painted two haunting portraits of Renee Good and Alex Pretti. That on top of a few other things she was doing, like serving on the fund raising, logistics, and outreach committees for No Kings 3; setting up its bank account, Venmo, GOFundme, and Printify accounts; and “designing some stuff, leafletting, whatever. I have my own art business and I was the bookkeeper at the Art Students League of NY [so] I am pretty organized.”

In addition to all of that, she delivers Meals on Wheels to homebound elderly every week, something she started when President Donald J. Trump took office. “It’s important to me,” she says, noting she’d love others to consider doing it.

So why, with so many demands on her time, is she carving out such big blocks of it to work on No Kings 3?

“While we have faced threats to our democracy before, we have never faced such a full-out attack and attempt by the powerful and billionaire elite to take over our country,” she says. “I'm concerned that the level of violence from the government is going to increase and we will have to stay strong to continue to fight back in a non-violent, organized and disciplined way.”

Worrying about such dire things can be exhausting. “The struggle to work together to create the kind of world we hope to see is real and it does take a toll,” she says.

At the same time, a lot of it has been more fun than she expected. “I have grown to love leafleting and [hanging banners on interstate overpasses] and the No Kings 2 march was amazing!”

Plus, she says, she’s made “such great friends!”

Bottom line, she’s doing this because she has to. If we don’t come together now to push back against this administration, “we will be living under a dictatorship of the rich and powerful,” she says. It is worth whatever effort it takes, and “I hope we save our democracy and create a better country that works for all of us.”

And she is learning so much, along the way. “I feel my participation is critical because I have lived a life of white privilege. I have basically done what I wanted my whole life. I was tragically unaware of what many people in America were facing on a daily basis.”

Interested in joining the fight? Click here.