Twelve sheep and a sheepdog walk into the Louvre.
If it sounds like the beginning of a joke, it’s not. In Paris Friday, French farmers protesting European Union agricultural policy herded a flock of sheep down the steps of the Louvre’s famous glass pyramid entrance and then into the museum itself. The protesters were from the Peasants’ Confederation and were fighting against subsidy cuts the EU is proposing that could hurt small farms.
The Amplification Project: Digital Archive for Forced Migration, Contemporary Art, and Action (https://theamplificationproject.com) is a community-led participatory public digital archive to which any artist and activist can document, preserve and share their work inspired, influenced, or affected by forced migration.
Camp Mossandsticks, named after moss and sticks--two of the most rudimentary tools with which one can spark fire--is a site for young women and girls to become resourceful, defiant, and self-sufficient revolutionaries of today. Started on November 6, 2012, the camp hosts workshops to spark the attendees’ inner political flames, challenging them to confront disenfranchisement created by the status quo and to take matters into their own hands.
For artist Christine Sun Kim, sound is a "ghost." The multiple-MFA-holding Senior TED Fellow who has had a Whitney Museum residency and exhibited at MoMA, has been profoundly deaf since birth. The sonic hush in which she lives has pushed her towards exploring sound through her work in a varied oeuvre of performance, installation, drawing, and video.
Cut and Paint is a website with free access to a wide variety of visual designs that can be printed out, cut, and used as graffiti stencils anywhere. Access to a variety of resolutions of each design is free for all, and there is a standing invitation for artist-activists to contribute their own designs for others to use.
No Home Gallery is a traveling gallery that curates exhibitions and happenings in various living and studio spaces in New York City. In an attempt to make contemporary art accessible and inviting, No Home offers emerging artists and art enthusiasts a forum for collaboration and creation.
Located within Boston’s historic (brick) core, and using the history of Boston as example, this kinetic, site-specific, public art installation is a humorous commentary on our use and trust of the internet for learning.
With World Comics India, the organization he started, Sharad has pioneered a cheap and easy medium for poor people to communicate meaningfully on issues that are neglected by the conventional media. While the urban elite dominates public media, the grinding day-to-day concerns of millions are rarely heard. Layers of discrimination and abuse heaped on huge numbers of people keep their problems out of sight and out of mind.
The Democracy Machine! is a performative sculpture that gives participants the opportunity to experience the thrill of democracy in action, in a competitive game that challenges people to work together toward understanding a better society. Using the spectacle and play of performance drawn from Las Vegas Casinos, gambling machines and game shows, The Democracy Machine!
On September 5th, 1991, I put a giant condom over Jesse Helms’ house. Why? Because, as the condom said, “Helms is deadlier than a virus.” Senator Jesse Helms was one of the chief architects of AIDS-related stigma in the U.S. He fought against any federal spending on HIV research, treatment or prevention.
What is Art for Social Change?
There are many ways of defining art for social change. In each of these cases, art for social change strives toward effective engagement with social issues that integrate and celebrate imaginative thinking, helping people to find new ways to see and be engaged in the world. In the context of the ASC Project, three types of art for social change are considered:
Serene colors and technical set pieces create a surreal ambience as performers delicately hover into the black void above the stage. These performers belong to Kinetic Light, an "internationally-recognized disability arts ensemble". In 2022, the ensemble performed Wired, a "potent contemporary aerial dance performance that explores race, gender, and disability stories of barbed wire in the United States".
After being contacted by a member of the Occupy Wall Street Alternative Banking group , illustrator Marc Scheff agreed to do a few drawings for a deck of cards depicting some of the people and institutions responsible for causing the Great Recession.
Between A Rock And A Hard Place is a project consisting of a cleaning performance, a film and a big event on August 18, 2012. From the material recorded on this day, a film and a vinyl record will be made.
These graffiti artists were given carte blanche over an entire warehouse to do with what they wanted. The result? Everything from the soundtrack from the videography, editing and the painting is just absolute brilliance.
From Black Power to Migrants’ Power
BY Robin Cembalest POSTED 01/22/13
As ’60s activist art enters museums, a new generation is creating an iconography of protest for today
Charged with participating in demonstrations against the Islamic Republic of Iran, Soudabeh Ardavan was held for eight years (1981-1989) in Iran’s notorious Evin Prison. She found sanity and solace through the forbidden activities of drawing and painting, secretly producing paint from flower petals and tea, using brushes made from toothpicks and human hair.
(SUBSCRIBE AT http://typingsyria.com/)
Typing…SYRIA is a one month socio-artistic performance piece where any individual can subscribe to witness a WhatsApp conversation between two Syrian characters play out in real time.
“Teilchenbeschleuniger” ist ein investigatives Kunstprojekt des Künstlerduos 431art, welches Atomenergie kritisch reflektiert. Der “Teilchenbeschleuniger” verteilt Teilchen namens “Jülicher Törtchen”, “Brokdorfer Mürbchen” oder “Muffins Fukushima” an die Bevölkerung.
A video collaboration betweenHayley Silverman and Emily Shinada. Using clips from a Japanese pornography film, the video highlights fears of interpersonal connection and explores the objectification of women. It was on view at Alogon Gallery for theWomen Get Fucked exhibition.
Green Map UAE is a place to pin, share, and quite literally, map out locations or events that are unique ecologically, culturally and considered civic resources near home or while traveling within the UAE. This portal, apart of a larger mapmaking community across more than 63 countries, uses the same tools and mapping widgets as the major Green Maps projects in the United States and Europe.
Rufina Bazlova is not afraid to surrender her art to activism. Born in Belarus, a former Soviet republic ruled by the authoritarian leader Aleksandr Lukashenko for 29 years now, Bazlova knows all too well that being apolitical is a privilege many Eastern Europeans cannot afford. 2020 was a pivotal year for Belarus, not only because of the COVID-19 pandemic but also the presidential elections, which declared Lukashenko president for the sixth time.
The humorously critical project offered people an opportunity to compare themselves to the supermodel silhouette: face to face in the imaginary impression of a mirror, or at real physical scale.
The idea was born out of a serious concern with the publicized woman's body - our social obsession with thin ideals - that falls nowhere close to average or, for the majority of the population, healthy.
Oakland-based artist-activists Melanie Cervantes and Jesus Barraza teamed up to form Dignidad Rebelde, a graphic arts collaboration working for social change. They believe that art can be an empowering reflection of
community struggles, dreams and visions, and following principles of
Xicanisma and Zapatismo, create work that translates people’s stories