Joey Forsyte knows that “The only cure for grief is action.” Her beloved mother died shortly before Hilary Clinton lost the election for president. Overwhelmed by grief and loss, Forsyte was transformed into “a different person,” a person who—like her holocaust survivor parents—was committed to political action. She attended the January 2017 Women’s March in Washington D.C. and her new concerns coalesced around voting rights for young people.

Later that year, Forsyte worked with her husband Alexander Kritselis and colleague Lawrence Gipe to curate “One Year: The Art of Politics in Los Angeles” at the Brand Library. (It was scheduled to open one year after the 2016 election). While working on “One Year,” Forsyte organized A Band of Voters, which she describes as a “multicultural, multigenerational collective of activists, artists, filmmakers and student leaders,” committed to voting rights. A Band of Voters worked with hundreds of young people to encourage them to register, get informed, invite a friend—and vote.

Grief Rising/A Band of Voters/Jammal Lemy, Joey Forsyte, Photography by Dan Battisa.

A Band of Voters activists scheduled multiple conversations with young people about why they need to vote. They participated in “Into Action” in January 2018 and the March For Our Lives in March later that year. Forsyte—who is an accomplished filmmaker—produced the “I Vote For” series of shorts about 12 young activists. Jammal Lemy, one of the founders of March for Our Lives, is voting for “gun violence prevention.” Rosalind Jones, who works with Feminist Majority Foundation, asserts that she votes for “every activist that will come after me.” And Adriana Ibanez-Martinez votes for “LGBTQ rights.” (The films can be seen on the Band of Voters website: abandofvoters.org/#i-vote-for.)

A Band of Voters worked on eight college campuses, producing events called “Party to the Polls” gatherings. Students were urged to invite their friends and vote together as a social event. As Forsyte and her team did this work, they realized they needed to go further. So they decided to create legislation to encourage and support student voting. It took them over nine months to write and pass “The Student Civic and Voter Empowerment Act.” The bill was signed into law by Governor Newsom in October 2019.

A Band of Voters also has created and distributed a zine they call the 2020 Voter Power Guide. (A Mark Steven Greenfield image of a fist emerging from a cartoonlike explosion is on the cover.) And they continue to work on their website.

GriefRising/A Band of Voters/Adriana Ibanez, Joey Forsyte Photgraphy by Dan Batista.

Forsyte is committed to using art to create change. She hopes to activate people, especially young people, through collaboration and community building. She is very aware that their grief about our ongoing social ills can be harnessed for political action (just as profound grief over the death of George Floyd has led to hundreds of national protests.)

What follows are excerpts from the Band of Voters manifesto:

Our vote is our power.

We will not be silenced.

Our future depends on it (…)

Our numbers are our power.

There is joy in collective power (…)

There is joy in voting.

2020 is the year we Party to the Polls.

2020 is the year we Claim our Power.

Signed,

The Largest Generation in History