Blackness as a color and, in some ways, as a culture often finds itself in close proximity to death. Despite the vivid brilliance of Black creativity and expression, the richness innate to Blackness (a quality associated with a shade so powerful it absorbs the energy from all other hues into its depths) has been diluted by an omnipresence of grief. In the Western imagination, black is the color of funeral attire, a simple shorthand for mourning. And for the people it’s used to describe, the association becomes even more charged: Black is coded as a threat, as a burden, and yet somehow invisible, too.