WC Wisconsin News

Wisconsin natives created an organization with a goal of highlighting the arts. 

This comes after a two-week journey on foot supporting the Black Lives Matter protests.

After Jared Choate participated in the peaceful protest for Jacob Blake, who was shot in the back by police officer Rusten Sheskey in Kenosha, he and Kelly Choate formed the Midwest Coast. The couple lived in California for a decade before returning to Wisconsin.

“We walked across Wisconsin because we [were] fed up,” Jared said in Volume One. “We are fed up at a nation that not only lets cops murder black people like Breonna Taylor, we are fed up with a toxic judicial system that acquits all officers of any wrongdoing in her shooting, and in doing so, essentially co-signs their unjustified murder by the police who are allegedly here to protect us. But now more than ever, that ‘us’ seems to solely represent us, the white community.”

Midwest Coast is new to the art scene. It had its opening day recently, and it was a hit as tickets sold out. The show was at the bar Odd Humyns, with live performances by LGBTQ musicians.

“It’s such a beautiful thing to see the community come out,” Jared said on WI Proud. “It was [its] first show since pre-COVID, and seeing people in a room, it was emotional. It was deeply emotional.”

Now having the organization, the couple wants to show their community how the arts have an emotional impact on an individual, regardless of medium.

“What better way to do that than through experiencing someone else’s joy and pain, whether it be on the big screen or through someone’s music," Kelly said on WEAU. "You can feel it and learn from it.”