Eme Freethinker
Dominican-born street artist
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Jesús Cruz Artiles (born 11 September 1979), known professionally as Eme Freethinker,[a] is a Dominican-born street artist based in Berlin, Germany. Described as an artivist,[2] his work primarily consists of graffiti commenting on social and political events.
Jesús Cruz Artiles was born in the Dominican Republic[3] on 11 September 1979.[4] In his hometown of Santo Domingo, he witnessed an extrajudicial killing by police as a teenager. This experience deeply affected him emotionally and likely influenced his art to incorporate themes of social struggle.[5]
Following George Floyd's murder by police in May 2020, which reminded him of the killing he had seen before, Eme Freethinker dedicated a mural to Floyd in Berlin's Mauerpark.[6] The mural, painted on one of the remaining sections of the Berlin Wall, is a portrait of Floyd alongside the words "I can't breathe" which serves as a memorial to him.[3] He further painted portraits of other famous Black Americans there, including Malcolm X, Martin Luther King Jr., Angela Davis, Jean-Michel Basquiat and Prince.[7]
Freethinker, who is based in Berlin, had previously painted on the wall satirical murals of the 2020 toilet paper shortage featuring Gollum.[8][9] Another work depicts Chinese president Xi Jinping and American president Donald Trump kissing each other in facemasks, satirizing China–United States relations during the COVID-19 pandemic.[10] In the wake of the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine, he created an anti-war wall mural depicting a Ukrainian and Russian child embracing one another.[11] A month later, he created a mural parodying the Chris Rock–Will Smith slapping incident.[12]