How can art effect political change?

Flash Points

W.A.G.E. Against the Machine

by Trong Gia Nguyen | Apr 27, 2009

Flash Points

W.A.G.E. Against the Machine

by Trong Gia Nguyen | Apr 27, 2009

Last September, as part of Creative Time’s Democracy in America: The National Campaign event at the Park Avenue Armory, activist group Working Artists and the Greater Economy (W.A.G.E.) stumped for …

Flash Points

Letter from London

Letter from London: Guernica Revisited

by Ben Street | Apr 20, 2009

Flash Points

Letter from London

Letter from London: Guernica Revisited

by Ben Street | Apr 20, 2009

It seems impossible now that an institution like the Museum of Modern Art would lend, say, Les Demoiselles d’Avignon or The Red Studio at all, let alone to a small …

Flash Points

My fellow Americans, let’s roll.

by Daniel Fuller | Apr 16, 2009

Flash Points

My fellow Americans, let’s roll.

by Daniel Fuller | Apr 16, 2009

On March 28th, Philadelphia hosted a day-long marathon dialogue on the intersections of art and the possibility of social/political change. The day’s events included a symposium on Curating and Activism …

Flash Points

Curating and Activism at Moore College of Art & Design

by Daniel Fuller | Apr 15, 2009

Flash Points

Curating and Activism at Moore College of Art & Design

by Daniel Fuller | Apr 15, 2009

Daniel Fuller, Senior Program Specialist at the Philadelphia Exhibitions Initiative, recently helped organize the Curating and Activism symposium at Moore College of Art & Design. The following is a recap …

Flash Points

Flash Points: Art+Politics, Looking Back & Moving Forward

by Hrag Vartanian | Apr 1, 2009

Flash Points

Flash Points: Art+Politics, Looking Back & Moving Forward

by Hrag Vartanian | Apr 1, 2009

These last two months have proved to be full of lively posts about the sometimes clear and often nebulous intersection of Art+Politics. Art21’s own Marc Mayer kicked things off when …

Flash Points

Teaching with Contemporary Art

Making Artistic Noise Part 2: Contemporary Activist Art

by Lauren Adelman | Mar 13, 2009

Flash Points

Teaching with Contemporary Art

Making Artistic Noise Part 2: Contemporary Activist Art

by Lauren Adelman | Mar 13, 2009

To continue from my first post, at Artistic Noise, we teach a curriculum that focuses on issues relevant to the lives of incarcerated and system-involved youth and uses art to …

Flash Points

Teaching with Contemporary Art

Making Artistic Noise Part 1: Art and Social Activism with Incarcerated Youth

by Lauren Adelman | Mar 12, 2009

Flash Points

Teaching with Contemporary Art

Making Artistic Noise Part 1: Art and Social Activism with Incarcerated Youth

by Lauren Adelman | Mar 12, 2009

noise [noiz] noun – a loud, surprising, irritating, or unwanted sound In 2001, I was approached by Fran Sherman of the Juvenile Rights Advocacy Project to help develop an arts …

Flash Points

Election 2008: Seizing the moment in the classroom

by Dillon Paul | Mar 12, 2009

Flash Points

Election 2008: Seizing the moment in the classroom

by Dillon Paul | Mar 12, 2009

One of the things I love most about teaching 12th grade is the sense that I am meeting students on the border between their child and adult selves. They are …

Flash Points

A better “we” through art? AREA Chicago’s Daniel Tucker on art and community

by Daniel Tucker | Mar 6, 2009

Flash Points

A better “we” through art? AREA Chicago’s Daniel Tucker on art and community

by Daniel Tucker | Mar 6, 2009

This post is written as a dispatch from California, where I was at the College Art Association conference and speaking in classes at CalArts, SFAI, and the CCA Social Practices …

Flash Points

Fight the man! Three activist artists to watch

by Paddy Johnson | Mar 4, 2009

Flash Points

Fight the man! Three activist artists to watch

by Paddy Johnson | Mar 4, 2009

True story: I used to hate activist art. “Why so shrill?” I thought. “Can’t we just talk about this rather than producing a bunch of bad art?” I don’t always …

Flash Points

Authenticity 2.0

by Audrey Chan | Mar 3, 2009

Flash Points

Authenticity 2.0

by Audrey Chan | Mar 3, 2009

At the École des Beaux-Arts de Nantes (Nantes School of Art), I am teaching a course called “Contemporary Art in the United States, 2000-Today.” The premise of the course is …

Flash Points

Practical propaganda: Amy Franceschini reinvents the Victory Garden

by Paul Schmelzer | Mar 1, 2009

Flash Points

Practical propaganda: Amy Franceschini reinvents the Victory Garden

by Paul Schmelzer | Mar 1, 2009

Amy Franceschini is my favorite kind of propagandist: she creates enticing imagery you can’t help but rally around, but backs it up with dirt-under-the-fingernails pragmatism in service of a nearly …

Flash Points

Where’s all the rightwing street art?

by Paul Schmelzer | Feb 26, 2009

Flash Points

Where’s all the rightwing street art?

by Paul Schmelzer | Feb 26, 2009

Learning of Princess Hijab—a Paris-based street artist who culturejams advertisements to include her namesake headscarf—an old question came to mind: where are all the rightwing graffiti artists, stencil afficionados, and …

Flash Points

Share and Share Alike

by Sharon Butler | Feb 25, 2009

Flash Points

Share and Share Alike

by Sharon Butler | Feb 25, 2009

Artists who garner the most attention in any given time period are those whose work, explicitly or implicitly, reflects the deeper political sensibilities of the era. Right now, contemporary artists …

Flash Points

Chakkrit Chimnok’s banana-leaf utopia

by Paul Schmelzer | Feb 24, 2009

Flash Points

Chakkrit Chimnok’s banana-leaf utopia

by Paul Schmelzer | Feb 24, 2009

Chakkrit Chimnok dreams of a “banana world,” a utopia in which overlooked or discarded items — specifically, the ubiquitous banana leaves that litter the streets in his home city of …

Flash Points

Transcending protest: Looking for pragmatic or poetic art of change

by Paul Schmelzer | Feb 23, 2009

Flash Points

Transcending protest: Looking for pragmatic or poetic art of change

by Paul Schmelzer | Feb 23, 2009

This weekend I went to an opening at The Soap Factory, a scrappy and often-excellent nonprofit art space a block or so off Minneapolis’ riverfront. The description of the work, …

Flash Points

Obama Special, Part 2

by Daniel Quiles | Feb 19, 2009

Flash Points

Obama Special, Part 2

by Daniel Quiles | Feb 19, 2009

This continues my previous post about the laptop DJ/performance artist Girl Talk, in which I situate him in a lineage of intersections between art and music and suggest a link …

Flash Points

Teaching with Contemporary Art

Hope and Change, Part 2

by Joe Fusaro | Feb 18, 2009

Flash Points

Teaching with Contemporary Art

Hope and Change, Part 2

by Joe Fusaro | Feb 18, 2009

On February 13th I received this message, as many of you did, from Americans for the Arts: Just moments ago, the U.S. House of Representatives approved their final version of …

Flash Points

Sade 2.0

by Thomas Micchelli | Feb 17, 2009

Flash Points

Sade 2.0

by Thomas Micchelli | Feb 17, 2009

On February 7th I drove to the Kasser Theater at Montclair State University to see a performance of The Investigation, a 1966 documentary drama by Peter Weiss (1916-1982), the expatriate German artist and …

Flash Points

Artful Prudence

by Kristin Farr | Feb 13, 2009

Flash Points

Artful Prudence

by Kristin Farr | Feb 13, 2009

politic adjective 1. marked by artful prudence, expedience, and shrewdness. Art and politics have a complex relationship. In the past week, I’ve seen city officials propose the elimination of arts positions, …

Flash Points

Il a chaud au Cul

by Naomi Beckwith | Feb 12, 2009

Flash Points

Il a chaud au Cul

by Naomi Beckwith | Feb 12, 2009

Not at all surprisingly for a corporate entity, the Associated Press recently established ownership of a photograph of Barack Obama taken at a 2006 National Press Club event by photographer …

Art21 Extended Play

Jessica Stockholder | Beauty & Politics

by Wesley Miller | Feb 12, 2009

Art21 Extended Play

Jessica Stockholder | Beauty & Politics

by Wesley Miller | Feb 12, 2009

DOWNLOAD VIA ITUNES | SUBSCRIBE VIA RSS EXCLUSIVE: In her New Haven, Connecticut studio, artist Jessica Stockholder discusses the relationship between beauty, pleasure and taste, and how all three have …

Rome on a Roman Holiday

by Naomi Beckwith | Feb 10, 2009

Rome on a Roman Holiday

by Naomi Beckwith | Feb 10, 2009

In the depths of a seemingly endless New York winter, my mind is already thinking toward late spring days on the Adriatic and the 53rd International Art Exhibition at la …

Flash Points

Lilly Ledbetter* Art

by Naomi Beckwith | Feb 4, 2009

Flash Points

Lilly Ledbetter* Art

by Naomi Beckwith | Feb 4, 2009

It is only a coincidence that the world’s largest franchised art fair and the international banking regulatory body share a moniker from their shared base, Basel, Switzerland, but no coincidence …

Flash Points

How might political change affect art?

by Beth Allen | Feb 3, 2009

Flash Points

How might political change affect art?

by Beth Allen | Feb 3, 2009

Diego Rivera, Detroit Industry, 1932-33. North Wall at the Detroit Institute of the Arts. I must say I’m finding the vociferous opposition in Congress over the allocation of a mere …

Flash Points

International Geographic: Interview with Nato Thompson

by Daniel Quiles | Jan 31, 2009

Flash Points

International Geographic: Interview with Nato Thompson

by Daniel Quiles | Jan 31, 2009

* Revised February 4, 2009. Lize Mogel, Mappa Mundi, digital print, 2008. Courtesy Melville House and iCI. Melville House and iCI recently co-published the exhibition catalogue for Experimental Geography, an …

Flash Points

Extimasies: Art, Politics, Society in Times of Crisis

by Georgia Kotretsos | Jan 30, 2009

Flash Points

Extimasies: Art, Politics, Society in Times of Crisis

by Georgia Kotretsos | Jan 30, 2009

The Extimasies: Art, Politics, Society in Times of Crisis symposium recently took place on Saturday, January 10 at the Benaki Musuem on Pireos Street in Athens, Greece. Co-organized by Costis …

Flash Points

Art21 Extended Play

Jenny Holzer | Programming

by Wesley Miller | Jan 29, 2009

Flash Points

Art21 Extended Play

Jenny Holzer | Programming

by Wesley Miller | Jan 29, 2009

EXCLUSIVE: Jenny Holzer discusses the programming of her LED sculptures during the installation of the exhibition PROTECT PROTECT at the Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago. Featured works include MONUMENT (2008), …

Flash Points

Obama Special, Part 1

by Daniel Quiles | Jan 26, 2009

Flash Points

Obama Special, Part 1

by Daniel Quiles | Jan 26, 2009

What follows is just a bit late for the inauguration, which is appropriate. It is essentially old news. Let’s start with the “Flash Points” question of the week: how can …

Flash Points

Letter from London

Letter From London: Dissent (of a Woman)

by Ben Street | Jan 26, 2009

Flash Points

Letter from London

Letter From London: Dissent (of a Woman)

by Ben Street | Jan 26, 2009

After the assassination of JFK in 1963, Lenny Bruce said, “They put two graves in Arlington—one for John Kennedy and one for Vaughn Meader.” Meader was a pitch-perfect Kennedy impersonator …

Art21 Extended Play

Jenny Holzer | Writing & Difficulty

by Wesley Miller | Jan 23, 2009

Art21 Extended Play

Jenny Holzer | Writing & Difficulty

by Wesley Miller | Jan 23, 2009

EXCLUSIVE: Jenny Holzer discusses her difficult relationship to writing during the installation of the exhibition PROTECT PROTECT at the Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago. Featured works include Red Yellow Looming …

Flash Points

A Fairey Tale

by Tavia Nyong'o | Jan 22, 2009

Flash Points

A Fairey Tale

by Tavia Nyong'o | Jan 22, 2009

[youtube:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q_EOzZ9iaJQ] The German-Jewish philosopher Walter Benjamin concludes his 1935 essay on “The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction” with a dialectical challenge. He called on would-be art …

Flash Points

Art and Politics: An Introduction

by Marc Mayer | Jan 21, 2009

Flash Points

Art and Politics: An Introduction

by Marc Mayer | Jan 21, 2009

FLASH POINTS is a regular conversational series that focuses on issues relevant to the state of the art world at large, contemporary art education, and issues artists face today. You …