The Local Artists Helping The Brooklyn Nets Unite Next Season

By Lucas Wisenthal

Sekou Jackson is, by his own admission, a maximalist. A native New Yorker, he grew up admiring the graffiti he’d see around the city. But while his own run hitting walls was short, as an illustrator and designer, he was left with an impulse to fill any space he’s allotted with characters of his own creation. 

“It’ll be one person,” Jackson told Brooklyn Magazine. “They’ll probably be eating a plate, and then I’ll have someone else in the back, dancing. So the whole paper is filled, or the whole canvas is filled, and has color. You’re kind of looking at everything, so it’s cohesive.”

Next March, Jackson will show new, specially commissioned pieces of his work at Barclays Center, where it will help commemorate HBCU Homecoming Night at the arena. Jackson is one of seven artists who make up the Nets’ inaugural Nets Unite collective, a group whose work the team will highlight on nights across the team’s upcoming season, turning Barclays into a community gallery with installations of their work and limited-edition merch collaborations for sale.

“This is really amazing to be a part of, because it’s the team I love,” says Jackson, a graduate of North Carolina A&T State University. “To be able to showcase a culture of mine, which is, I went to HBCU, and I love what I learned from my HBCU. So the fact that I get to show with my favorite team in New York City is amazing.”

Alongside Jackson, the first Nets Unite class includes illustrator Ro Maharjan, whose work will be part of AAPI Night; lettering artist Carlos Colom, who will take part in Noche Latina; illustrator Jordan Moss, spotlighted throughout Black History Month; Anthony Irwin, also an illustrator, whose work will adorn Barclays Center for Pride Night; designer Jesse Sosa Jr., showing for the Carribean Carnival, and Christina Kwiek, whose designs will appear as part of Woman’s Impact Night.

Moss, like Jackson, has sentimental ties to the Nets, giving the opportunity to work with the team a deeper resonance for her. “My dad, we used to have season passes when I was a kid to go see the Nets in Jersey,” Moss said. “He’s no longer with us, but if he knew this is what I was doing right now, after those trips of him dragging me to Jersey, I think that would be really special.”

Sosa, a Brooklyn artist born in Trinidad, took what he says was the biggest risk of his career last year, when, after a decade, he stepped away from carnival design.

“Platforms like Nets Unite are important because it really does shine a light on artists like me, other younger artists who may not get that exposure,” he said. “But they’ll also be able to have a platform for their art and viewpoint, and that shows other younger artists that, hey, something is possible for you as well in your craft.”

Colom, who grew up in Puerto Rico, sees Nets Unite as a showcase not just for his work, but for his community. “I’m queer, I’m Latino, I’m a person of color,” Colom said. “So I think just seeing someone like me on a platform this big, and getting to do all this amazing work, it just fills me up with joy and also optimism.”

See the 2026-27 Nets schedule, including special events, here.