Don't Shoot PDX: Community Art Build + Artist Talk with Tonita Cervantes

Join Don't Shoot PDX for an afternoon of community creativity, art-making, mutual aid, and conversation! This is an opportunity to connect with like-minded individuals and contribute to a collective effort that aims to bring about positive change in our community. This is a family-friendly event. Everyone is welcome!
Event Schedule:
12:00 PM – 2:00 PM
Community Art Build + Screenprinting

• Art Build, button making, and mutual aid tabling in the Atrium and Hallway
• Screenprinting signs for Don’t Shoot PDX’s annual Reclaim MLK March in January!

Advocacy aligned organizations and individuals should contact us at [email protected] to get involved.

2:00 PM – 3:00 PM
Artist Talk with Tonita Cervantes
Photographer and photojournalist will speak about her exhibition, A Retrospective on the Indigenous-Led Movement at Standing Rock, and her photography practice.

Pacific Northwest College of Art
511 NW Broadway, Portland
November 15, 2025
12PM -3:00PM

is an arts and education organization that promotes social justice and civic participation. Our mission is to harness the power of creative expression to inspire, educate, and mobilize communities towards equity, justice, and transformative social impact. @dontshootpdx

Tonita’s work highlights the common threads that connect people from all walks of life. Their sorrows, joys, and dreams for a better future reflect the essence of humanity. 

As a social documentary photojournalist, she takes an aggressive boots-on-the-ground approach. In her childhood, she was always drawn to the underdog and the invisible—perhaps because of her strong feeling of not belonging. 

After spending years in Hollywood as a casting director and feeling spiritually unfulfilled, she left the studio and picked up a camera. It was time to tell the stories of those who don’t have a voice, illustrating their viewpoint rather than casting for commercials that promote consumer products that nobody needs. Her artistic goal is to capture the unguarded moment by focusing on the window to the soul - their eyes.

She is intrigued by the resilience that emerges in the face of limited resources. Witnessing the human spirit and the indomitable will of communities striving to survive against all odds is both humbling and inspiring. 

Today, the country is rapidly barreling at an accelerated pace toward a dangerous and uncertain future filled with unimaginable challenges. However, prophecies from ancient ancestors urge us not to give up, to have faith in the Creator, and to continue the fight for a sustainable future.

In 1877, Chief Crazy Horse of the Lakota people, a mystic and fierce warrior, had a vision: "I see a time of seven generations, when all the colors of mankind will gather under the sacred tree of life and the whole earth will become one circle again.”                                                                                  

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Host or Publisher Hallie Ford School of Graduate Studies at PNCA