More than 50 years after Martin Luther King Jr.'s "I Have a Dream" speech, our nation still is wrestling with the repercussions of decisions our forefathers made multiple generations ago. Before we can continue building a future, it will help to better understand our past - no matter how painful that past can be. One of the many ways the arts is beneficial to a community is that it portrays the past in thought-provoking and nonconfrontational ways, allowing for true reflection of painful or uncomfortable memories.