Projects tagged "Politics & Government"

"From Wall Street to Cairo", featuring Fire in Cairo
Practitioner:
Matthew Conners, Photo Journalist by John Otis, Reporter
Date:
Apr 6 2016
Matthew Connors spent much of 2012 in Lower Manhattan making portraits of the protesters in the Occupy Wall Street movement. But a chance encounter during the course of that project made him do a 180-degree turn after meeting some Egyptian activists who had participated in a different uprising: the Jan. 25 revolution that led to the ousting of President Hosni Mubarak. They convinced Mr.
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Sh*t the FBI says
Practitioner:
Green is the New Red
Date:
Jan 9 2012
By Will Potter  I tried to resist.  I really did.  But when I jokingly posted on the Green is the New Red Facebook page that I wanted to make a “Sh*t the FBI Says” video, ya’ll went nuts about the idea.  Like the videos that started the trend, it’s pretty goofy.  But sadly, it’s all based on statements the FBI has made in court, in the press, or to activists themselves (I’ve heard quite a few of these myself).
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A Piece of Red Cloth - Rock n' Roll Performed in 1989
Practitioner:
Cui Jian
Date:
Jun 19 1989
“I performed at Tiananmen Square in 1989, 15 days before the crackdown. I sang A Piece of Red Cloth (一块红布), a tune about alienation. I covered my eyes with a red cloth to symbolize my feelings. The students were heroes. They needed me, and I needed them. After Tiananmen, however, authorities banned concerts. We performed instead at “parties,” unofficial shows in hotels and restaurants”.
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Voices from the Conflict
Practitioner:
Benji Blatt, Aly Arkin
Date:
Dec 12 2023
Our NGO “Voices from the Conflict” seeks to open a conversation about the Israel-Palestine conflict through the lens of activist art. The history of the conflict dates back to the UN partition plan in 1947, followed by Israel’s independence in 1948. Since then, there have been several armed engagements between the two actors- causing massive civilian casualties and terrorism.
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5 Broken Camera
Practitioner:
Emad Burnat, Guy Davidi
Date:
Jan 1 2005
In 2005, Emad Burnat got a video camera to record the birth of his son. That same year, Israel's security barrier went right through his village of Bil'in in the West Bank. The fence cut off some fields and olive groves on the other side. When protests broke out against the establishment of the barrier, Burnat became the unofficial cameraman for the weekly anti-wall protests that drew support from around the world.
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A Dozen Writers Put Down Their Pens to Prove the Might of a March
Practitioner:
The people of Moscow
Date:
Mar 7 2014
There were no opposition leaders at the head of the vast column of people that peacefully wound its way through central Moscow on Sunday.
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Barbed Wire Protest
Practitioner:
Petr Pavlensky
Date:
May 2 2013
In May, 2013, Russian performance artist Petr Pavlovsky wrapped his body, nude, in barbed wire and lay outside the St. Petersburg legislative assembly. The act was in protest of restrictions imposed on freedom of speech and assembly. Police officers were forced to attempt to disengage him from the wire. After medical officials also arrived, Pavlovsky refused to be taken to the hospital and was brought to jail, where he was held for several weeks.
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Luminous Intervention beams ballot issues over Baltimore Highway
Practitioner:
Luminous Intervention
Date:
Nov 5 2012
"In preparation for tomorrow's election, members of artist-activist project Luminous Intervention beamed ballot-question themed slogans onto a bridge over Route 83 during rush hour traffic this evening. Today's action followed on the heels of an equality-themed luminous alteration of The Natty Boh/Utz Girl proposal billboard in Station North on Friday.
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untitled (tattoo, 2025)
Practitioner:
Jenny Holzer
Date:
Jan 31 2025
tattoo on someone's thigh which reads "FEAR IS THE MOST ELEGANT WEAPON. YOUR HANDS ARE NEVER MESSY. THREATENING HARM IS CRUEL. WORK INSTEAD ON MINDS AND BELIEFS. PLAY INSECURITIES LIKE A PIANO. BE CREATIVE IN APPROACH. FORCE ANXIETY TO EXCRUCIATING LEVELS OR GENTLY UNDERMINE THE PUBLIC CONFIDENCE. PANIC DRIVES HUMAN HERDS OVER CLIFFS; AN ALTERNATIVE IS TERROR-INDUCED IMMOBILIZATION. FEAR FEEDS ON FEAR. PUT THIS EFFICIENT PROCESS IN MOTION.
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Ge Yu Lu (road)
Practitioner:
Ge Yulu
Date:
Jan 1 2013
In 2017 Ge Yulu became a national sensation in China. That year, he submitted his final project as a student at the Central Academy of Fine Arts in Beijing, revealing the unnamed road in Beijing that he had claimed in 2014 as his own. Because the Lu character in his name means road, he erected a sign for Geyu Road that blended seamlessly into the setting.
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Actor Jim Carrey has emerged as an unlikely political artist and activist
Practitioner:
Jim Carrey
Date:
Jan 1 2018
Actor and comedian Jim Carrey has always been known for his slapstick silliness. You know the films — "Dumb and Dumber," "The Mask," "Liar Liar," "Ace Ventura," just to name a few. But he also always managed to peel back the comic goofiness for more serious turns in films like "The Truman Show" and "Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind."
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"1984" in Bangkok Streets
Practitioner:
Thailand protesters
Date:
May 30 2014
There are no whistles, no loud speakers, and no placards held up high in this quiet act of subversion. Pimsiri Petchnamrob stands silently in a mass of sharply dressed Bangkok commuters, her hands clutched around a copy of George Orwell's 1984. Next to her a small group of young men and women, their faces sombre and their heads bowed low, also read books about fictional and real totalitarian worlds in silence.
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Living and Killing in Modern China: "A Touch of Sin"
Practitioner:
Zhangke Jia (贾樟柯)
Date:
May 17 2013
"May you live in interesting times" is the familiar Chinese saying, usually spat out as a curse. You can see why in "A Touch of Sin," a film by renowned director Jia Zhang-ke. That kind of time is now, in the history of his country. With four vignettes inspired by real-life "ripped from the headline" events, he shows what the great economic expansion of China is doing to the majority of its people.
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The powerful images of Hong Kong’s protests
Practitioner:
Hong kong residents
Date:
Jun 1 2019
The face of Hong Kong’s chief executive Carrie Lam is falling apart: an eyeball has fallen out of its socket and the flesh of her left chin has been ripped off. Black-clad protesters in yellow hard hats are standing on top of her head, hanging a banner with ‘Hong Kong add oil’ on her forehead and shouting into her ear with a megaphone.
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Joseph Beuys, Coyote: I like America and America Likes Me, May 1974
Practitioner:
Joseph Beuys
Date:
Mar 1 1974
It was 1974 when Beuys arrived in New York City, ready to tackle a whole new challenge and create what was to become one of the most famous works of art of the time. Upon arrival, his assistants wrapped him in a large piece of felt and transported him, by ambulance, to the René Block Gallery in SoHo. There, awaiting the artist, was a live coyote. Beuys spent three consecutive days, eight hours at a time, locked up with the wild animal.
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Walkthrough
Practitioner:
Walid Raad
Date:
Oct 12 2015
MoMA presents the first comprehensive American survey of the leading contemporary artist Walid Raad (b. 1967, Lebanon), featuring his work in photography, video, sculpture, and performance from the last 25 years.
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Nadya Tolokonnikova - Pussy Riot: Punk's Not Dead
Practitioner:
Nadya Tolokonnikova
Date:
Jan 25 2025
Nadya Tolokonnikova is a Siberian artist and a creator of the feminist protest art collective Pussy Riot. Tolokonnikova’s political actions and wide-ranging performance interventions have established her as a leading voice in the fight against authoritarian power. During her residency, she will compose performances that demonstrate her multifaceted approach to resisting systems of oppression and dehumanization.
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Balls Across America
Practitioner:
The Yes Men
Date:
Jan 1 2008
The Survivaball made its first appearance in 2006, when "Halliburton representatives" attended a conference on catastrophic climate change and demonstrated the functionality of the large inflatable suits ("a gated community for one"), which keep corporate managers safe from global warming. Not long afterward, in Berlin, the Yes Men learned they also work as disruptive, arrest-resistant tools.
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China's censors tested by microbloggers who keep one step ahead of state media
Practitioner:
Weibo
Date:
Apr 15 2012
The Guardian By Tania Branigan In the opaque world of Chinese censorship, a few red lines shine through the murk. One of the clearest is: no gossip about top political leaders, their families or internal party affairs.
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The Swasticar
Practitioner:
Everyone Hates Elon
Date:
Feb 26 2025
It appears Elon Musk has enemies all over the world. The tech billionaire — currently the planet’s richest man and CEO of Tesla — has integrated himself into U.S. politics, becoming Donald Trump‘s head of a new Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) and aligned himself with far-right politicians in Europe.
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Weaponizing pink glitter
Practitioner:
Feminist Organizations
Date:
Aug 16 2019
On August 16, 2019 thousands of women marched in various cities across Mexico. One particular case may have triggered them, but these marches were an answer to the systematic violence against women and girls in our country.
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Grand Theft Auto V becomes battleground of Hong Kong protests
Practitioner:
Hong Kong Gamers
Date:
Dec 27 2019
The Hong Kong political crisis is now playing out in the virtual world. Popular online video game "Grand Theft Auto V" has become a battleground between protesters in the semi-autonomous Chinese city and their rival players in mainland China.
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Art Behind Bars: Prison Art by Soudabeh Ardavan
Practitioner:
Soudabeh Ardavan
Date:
Nov 30 1985
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.
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Beware the Russian dolls, says Amnesty ad
Practitioner:
Amnesty International
Date:
Apr 11 2012
Following last week's powerful death-penalty spot with the melting wax figures, Amnesty International in France moves on to Russian dolls to symbolize the hidden political repression and social terror in that country. "We must not let Russia's charm hide its atrocities" is the tagline from ad agency La Chose.
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performance art protest against campus lockdown due to covid
Practitioner:
student from Beijing Film Academy
Date:
Nov 22 2021
A performance art piece by a student who sat in a cage to protest a draconian lockdown of the Beijing Film Academy (BFA) recently went viral, and was censored just as quickly. Like many other Chinese citizens, university students have been living under strict lockdowns, and are beginning to chafe at the restrictions—and at administrators’ lack of responsiveness to students’ concerns.
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