Projects tagged "Cities"

Artists Tried to Activate Voters With Billboard Art. Did It Work?
Practitioner:
Hank Willis Thomas
Date:
Jan 13 2025
On Nov. 6, the day after the presidential election, the artist Hank Willis Thomas was at his studio in Brooklyn. His production assistants were poring over tables strewed with blobby red white and blue silk-screen prints of the words “Fragile/ Democracy / Handle With Care” in capital letters.
‘Memorial’
Practitioner:
Cheril Linnett and woman activists
Date:
Mar 8 2020
Cheril Linett is a female artist from Chile, with a background in performance art and stage performance, who primarily focuses her artwork on feminist issues in Chile, especially ones involving violence, murder, hate crime and different kinds of oppression and assault, but also creates artwork reflecting issues in other parts of Latin America.
ŠTO TE NEMA (WHY ARE NOT YOU HERE)
Practitioner:
Aida Šehović
Date:
Jul 11 2018
ŠTO TE NEMA is a public monument created as a response to Europe’s worst atrocity since World War II - the systematic killing of 8,372 Muslim men and boys in the UN-protected safe area of Srebrenica in Bosnia and Herzegovina in July of 1995.
The Sewer Soaperie: Cities, Oil and Human Behavior
Practitioner:
Catherine Sarah Young
Date:
Sep 26 2016
Many artists are inspired to bring climate change into their work after a direct experience with it. Catherine Sarah Young hopes her work helps people understand and talk about their experiences with climate change.
Double Happiness
Practitioner:
Didier Faustino
Date:
Jan 1 2009
Architect Didier Faustino strips a billboard down to its skeleton, repurposes it as a swing set, and names it Double Happiness. This "urban reactivation device" needs to become a world wide phenomenon. Imagine billboard swing sets waiting at every destination. The climb looks worth the view.
Soviet Army Monument - REDUX
Practitioner:
various activists
Date:
Feb 23 2014
Since the beginning of Bulgaria's transition to democracy, the monument’s meaning and future has been the subject of heated debates. Opponents to the monument aren’t happy about the presence of such a dominating foreign army monument in the country that is situated higher and more central than national symbols. In recent years, the monument has turned into a canvas for anonymous political statements on multiple occasions.
Nostalgia for the Light
Practitioner:
Patricio Guzmán
Date:
Mar 17 2011
The Atacama Desert in northern Chile — the setting of Patricio Guzmán’s transfixing cinematic essay “Nostalgia for the Light” — is a place where heaven and earth converge. Or some might say heaven and hell.
Nats Never Die/The Zombies are Coming!
Practitioner:
The Yes Men and Reclaim the City
Date:
Sep 30 2019
The Yes Men join Reclaim the City in their fight against unjust housing policy. On September 30, 2019, a horde of zombies attended a "#natsneverdie rally" at the Cape Town Civic Centre in order to celebrate Mayor Dan Plato and the Mayoral Committee and to support their policies, which are increasingly similar to those of the National Party under Apartheid.
Mystery Artist Paints Penises Around Potholes To Get Them Fixed
Practitioner:
Wanksy
Date:
Apr 10 2015
Armed with a can of washable spray paint, an artist in Greater Manchester, England, has embarked on a worthy crusade: to rid the region of potholes… by drawing penises on them. The anonymous artist, who goes by the name “Wanksy,” told the Manchester Evening News that he decided to draw attention to the “appalling” pothole-ridden streets after some of his cyclist friends were badly injured on the roads.
Wall Hunters: The Slumlord Project
Practitioner:
Wall Hunters Inc.
Date:
Oct 4 2013
Wallhunter's Slumlord Project is an innovative project in Baltimore, Maryland that will use street art to expose and publicize vacant and dilapidated housing and the responsible parties for those conditions. The project will use different street art forms to display art that will attract community interest and support community identity.
Ai Weiwei launches controversial public art project focused on immigration
Practitioner:
Ai Weiwei
Date:
Oct 11 2017
The artist has assembled a set of 300 installations around New York City, based around the concept of fences and borders, to showcase the ‘narrow-minded’ attempts used to ‘create some kind of hatred between people’
Book Burning Party - Troy Library
Practitioner:
Leo Burnett
Date:
May 8 2012
Troy, Michigan couldn't afford to keep its library open, so it scheduled a vote for a tax increase. A strong anti-tax group waged a dominating campaign against it. Posing as a political group, an outside advertising agency posted signs around town that said, "Vote to close Troy library Aug 2, book burning party Aug 5." We invited everyone to our Facebook page, adding Twitter, Foursquare, want ads, flyers and more to drive engagement.
Mika Rottenberg: Cosmic Generator
Practitioner:
Mika Rottenberg
Date:
Jan 1 2017
Cosmic Generator presents a network of characters working in nonsensical, and at times absurd, economies. Artist Mika Rottenberg uses footage from actual discount dollar stores in Calexico, CA; Mexicali, Mexico; and Yiwu, China to recreate the imaginary “life” of a product, from its production in the factory to the moment it is sold.
Maman Sculpture
Practitioner:
Louise Bourgeois
Date:
Jan 1 1991
Through the use of mythical and archetypal iconography, Bourgeois translated her encounters into a very individualized symbolic imagery, employing things such as swirls, arachnids, cages, surgical equipment, and sewed appendages to represent the feminine mind, beauty, and mental agony.
Wearable Portable Architecture
Practitioner:
Mary Mattingly
Date:
May 13 2013
The “Wearable/Portable Architecture project” discussed the possibilities of having a locale create portable architecture based on the conditions of its environmental, urban and cultural conditions. It is structured to find ways in providing new arguments and sustaining an artistic impetus to our immediate environment.
La Casa Negra
Practitioner:
La Casa Negra
Date:
Apr 21 2016
La Casa Negra is a moving artist squat that occupies houses destined for demolition as temporary venues for site specific performance art in Barranco (Lima, Peru). Artists use all of the available rooms (kitchen, bathrooms, stairs, backyard) to enact a series of critical art pieces, while using the space as a demonstration of artist resilience in an increasingly gentrifying neighborhood.
Photographing Every Disappearing Manhattan Bodega
Practitioner:
Gail Victoria Braddock Quagliata
Date:
May 11 2015
"is a conceptual documentary project in which I photographed every Mom and Pop-style cornershop on the island of Manhattan as quickly as possible, as I walked each block in the city ( CLICK FOR A MAP of my route). I fear these veritable microcosms of NYC will be swallowed in the presently swelling wave of corporate homogeny.
Ghosts of Union Square - The Contested City
Practitioner:
Not An Alternative
Date:
Oct 1 2011
"This project took aim at a public relations campaign produced by The Union Square Partnership, a local Business Improvement District (BID) attempting to privatize the north end of NYC’s Union Square park and install a high-end celebrity chef restaurant. They hosted historical walking tours of the park for decision-makers, as a means of getting buy-in for their development initiative.
Bed-Stuy Aquarium
Practitioner:
Hajj-Malik Lovick and Gav and Je-Quan Irving
Date:
Aug 1 2024
The Bed-Stuy Aquarium (also known as the Hancock Street Bed-Stuy Aquarium) is a makeshift goldfish pond located on a sidewalk in the Bedford-Stuyvesant, Brooklyn neighborhood of New York City. The pond, originally formed by a puddle from a leaky fire hydrant, garnered attention from locals and the press beginning at the time of its creation in August 2024.
Urbaneer
Practitioner:
Terreform ONE
Date:
Mar 6 2013
Whose job is it to create a city? Our intention is to jumpstart a new profession that can re-invent and negotiate the complex mix that encompasses a city. We have defined a radical new occupation to regenerate, pioneer, and sustain the future urban realm. These innovative multi-disciplinarian advocates are called Urbaneers. Their immense task is to manifest and facilitate the next expression of city across the globe.
People of Japan is a snapshot of daily life across Tokyo, Kyoto and Osaka
Practitioner:
Mark Manzi
Date:
Mar 1 2021
For his latest project, Mark Manzi found himself outside of his comfort zone. For the Amsterdam-based photographer and designer, People of Japan was an attempt to break from his photography-first portfolio. “In the past, my work was very image-focused, whereas with this book I wanted to scan objects, collect receipts, record noises, add copy, and really create something visually striking,” he says.
#SaveNYC
Practitioner:
JEREMIAH MOSS, new yorkers
Date:
Mar 23 2015
#SaveNYC is a grassroots, crowd-sourced, DIY movement to protect and preserve the diversity and uniqueness of the urban fabric in New York City. As our vibrant streetscapes and neighborhoods are turned into bland, suburban-style shopping malls, filled with chain stores and glossy luxury retail, #SaveNYC is fighting for small businesses and cultural institutions to remain in place.
Art in Odd Places
Practitioner:
AiOP
Date:
Jul 19 1996
Art in Odd Places (AiOP) presents visual and performance art in unexpected public spaces. AiOP also produces an annual festival along 14th Street in Manhattan, NYC from Avenue C to the Hudson River each October.
I Have a Right Too...
Practitioner:
Contemporary Art Museum St. Louis
Date:
Oct 10 2014
CAM brings contemporary art and ideas directly to Saint Louis Public High School and Middle School students through its ArtReach program. Tailored to meet the needs of individual schools and teachers, ArtReach is designed to raise awareness of contemporary issues through an exploration of contemporary art. The program includes a curriculum-based offering of museum tours, school visits, and creative workshops for students and teachers alike.
Feminists in France change Paris street names to celebrate inspirational women
Practitioner:
Osez le Féminisme!
Date:
Aug 27 2015
A feminist group in France has been transforming the streets of Paris after noting that just 2.6 per cent are named after notable women. Tourists on the Ile de la Cité got a surprise when they found that almost all of the street signs in central Paris had been changed overnight.

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