Projects with Clear Short-Term Goals

These projects all have short-term goals. Ideally each contributes to a campaign with a clear, well-defined path to a goal. Ideally, there are targets—people, institutions—that the project (and/or campaign) pressures and which, if pressured, can help achieve the goal.
Tear It Down, They Said. He Just Kept Building.
Practitioner:
Chen Tianming
Date:
Jan 1 2025

The structure teeters over fields of knee-high grass, looking like a cross between a camping tent and a giant wedding cake. Eleven stories of dark red wooden rooms, diminishing in size as they ascend, balance atop one another, seemingly held together by only the thicket of cords that stretches from the peak to the ground.

Nanjing Yangtze River Bridge Suicide Intervention Program
Practitioner:
Artist Qiu Zhijie
Date:
Jul 8 2008

The Nanjing Yangtze River Bridge, completed in 1968, is one of China’s most iconic infrastructural projects and a potent symbol of national pride. Spanning over 6,700 meters across the Yangtze River, it was the first double-decked road-rail truss bridge designed and built entirely by Chinese engineers, without foreign assistance, during a time of intense geopolitical isolation.

White paper protest
Practitioner:
Nanjing Media College Student; People in China
Date:
Nov 26 2022

The White Paper Movement was a large-scale, decentralized protest movement that erupted across China in late November 2022, initially sparked by a student demonstration at the Communication University of China, Nanjing.

P.A.I.N. Die-Ins
Practitioner:
Nan Goldin & P.A.I.N.
Date:
Mar 10 2018

This afternoon, in the Sackler Wing of the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, a mother and daughter threw coins into its reflecting pool while a couple posed for engagement photos in front of the Temple of Dendur, the man in red pants and a gray blazer, the woman in a black jumpsuit. A long line snaked out of the temple. It was tranquil, most people speaking in a whisper. That grand space has such an effect on people.

With the Help of an Art Installation, Ukrainian Activists in NYC Canvass Voters for Support
Practitioner:
Ganna Smirnova, Vsevolod Myrnyi and Zhanna Galeyeva
Date:
Nov 4 2024

Four days before the U.S. presidential election, three Ukrainian activists gathered at a stranded fence in New York City’s East Village to hang an expansive information poster. “19546+ Ukrainian Children Abducted by Russia,” reads its headline in bold. From a black canvas, white letters jump out at the passersby, a haunting reminder of the toll the Russian invasion continues to inflict on Ukrainian families.

Korean women are fighting back against deepfakes
Practitioner:
Korean Gender Activist
Date:
Aug 22 2024

A few dozen women, wearing white masks, held up signs protesting against pornographic deepfakes. On the afternoon of Friday, August 30, several South Korean feminist collectives demonstrated in Seoul to fight these sex crimes that are flooding the country.

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