Dropping a Han Dynasty Urn (1995) by Ai Weiwei is a highly provocative work of art. This series of three black and white photographs portray the artist holding a 2,000-year-old Han dynasty urn that, frame by frame, he drops, it falls, and shatters. As much a work of photography as a work of performance art, in each still an unaffected Ai looks directly at the camera aware of his destructiveness.
Cyclist activists from the Koce, Return to the Street initiative set up sculptures symbolically showing the marginalization of cyclists in the city, the inadequate and dysfunctional infrastructure for this means of transport, but also to point out the large number of trampled bikers in Skopje.
The following is a description of the action that Huffington post published online on 6/25/2011:
"Student demonstrators took to the streets of Santiago dressed as goblins and ghouls from Michael Jackson’s 'Thriller' video in their latest spirited pursuit of higher education reforms."
Highlights:
A handful of teens donned puffy quinceañera dresses to protest against the “sanctuary cities” ban.
The teens gave paper flowers to lawmakers who voted against SB 4 and flyers to those who voted in favor.
Texas teens took part in a quinceañera-themed protest on the south steps of the Capitol to voice their opposition to Senate Bill 4, the so-called sanctuary cities ban.
Internet spreads word as networks shun adverts for Buy Nothing Day
Duncan Campbell in Los Angeles
The Guardian, Friday 24 November 2000
Today is America's Buy Nothing Day. An event that was started to poke pointed fun at consumerism is now being celebrated in more than 40 countries, embarrassing television networks and demonstrating the power of the internet as a political organising tool.
Featuring photographs that represent a unique collaboration between men held in supermax prisons and the photographers who fulfilled their requests.
Curated by Laurie Jo Reynolds, Tamms Year Ten, Jeanine Oleson, Parsons The New School for Design, and Jean Casella, Solitary Watch.
"Since March 2011, the artist Tim Devin has been putting broadsides (small posters) up around the Boston area.
The posters come in different kind of flavors: Street Surveys, Mappy Facts or Poems by Paul Johns.
A striking new cultural space is taking shape in New York’s Hudson Valley. Alex Grey and Allyson Grey, co-founders of CoSM, Chapel of Sacred Mirrors, have launched a Kickstarter campaign to build Entheon, sanctuary of visionary art, to ask for support to complete the build.
Transfixed by racial, political, and socioeconomic tensions saturating the news, movement artists Jon Boogz and Lil Buck, enveloped by the art of Alexa Meade, switch off the TV and release their emotion into a stirring dance that is both a lament and a spirited call to action.
Anjali Mehta is an illustrator from New Delhi, India. She is primarily known for her graphic shapes, gentle lines, bold colors, and strong female subjects. She is also designing a series titled Enroute Extinction that uses the same bright colors and familiar layout of a postage stamp. This series highlights animal species in India that are at risk of extinction.
In the context of the PhD research “Consciousness-raising: Activism in Digital Art” (by Ana Barata, Faculdade de Ciências Sociais e Humanas da UNL, Lisbon, Portugal) Carlos Latuff was interviewed concerning his political graphical work that focuses on present conflicts and issues.
Public Movement is a Tel Aviv based ‘performative research body’. Through large-scale performances in the public realm they construct alternative arenas for the consideration of communal identities – national, religious and cultural – revitalising debate around the distribution of power.
“Cabaret Con-Sensual is an effort comprised of actors, dancers, comedians, producers, writers, and other artists who strive to champion consent and discuss rape-culture through the subversive, yet expressive medium of the performing arts.”
The show was created by Bitsy La Bourbon, founder of the anti rape campaign and non profit organization More Than No.
Now that the dust has settled from the Met Gala, with all the excitement over Kylie Jenner’s bathroom selfie and Rihanna’s body-swallowing Comme des Garçons florals, it is worth pausing to consider a red carpet moment most people missed: the entrance of Joe Gebbia, co-founder and chief product officer of Airbnb, with Yeonmi Park, a North Korean refugee and international refugee activist.
On July 23rd 2011 a newly formed organization Multi-Story performed Stravinsky’s Rite of Spring in a multi-story car park in Peckham Rye London. In doing so it completely subverted the entrenched traditions of the performance of classical music. The organization used student musicians and did not charge admission.
Gender equality charity Women of the World (WOW) is launching a one-day festival of activism that invites people from all generations, genders and backgrounds to take part in conversations around sexual violence.