Projects tagged "Politics & Government"

Chinese artist speaks out against zero-Covid policy by wearing 27 hazmat suits in Times Square
Practitioner:
Zhisheng Wu
Date:
Oct 18 2022
On Sunday morning, a puffy, Michelin Man-like figure trudged through Times Square in New York, panting from the exertion of trying to move while wearing 27 hazmat suits. Inside the white cocoon was Zhisheng Wu, a Chinese artist who staged the street performance to criticize China’s unrelenting zero-Covid policy.
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Graffiti on the West Bank Barrier
Practitioner:
Various Artists
Date:
Jan 1 2004
In June 2002, the Israeli Government decided to construct a physical barrier separating Israel and the West Bank. The declared purpose of this (as yet unfinished) 709 kilometers long barrier—which came to be known as Gader Ha’hafrada (The Separation Wall)—was to prevent the entry of Palestinian terrorists from the occupied territories into Israel in order to protect Israeli citizens.
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S Korean students shave heads in protest over Japan's Fukushima water release plan
Practitioner:
Students in South Korean
Date:
Apr 20 2021
More than 30 South Korean college students shaved their heads in front of the Japanese embassy in Seoul on Tuesday to protest Japan's decision to release water from its crippled Fukushima nuclear plant into the sea. Police periodically dispersed crowds, who chanted and held placards but did not stop the event from taking place, though there is an anti-pandemic ban on gatherings larger than 10 people.
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50 People in 40 Square Meters
Practitioner:
Contemporary Art Center, Skopje
Date:
Feb 6 2016
In a case of voter fraud, an investigation revealed that the party in power had won fifty votes from the residents of a single apartment. A group of activists reproduced the apartment in a downtown square and invited 50 people inside. The action took just one part of the case, literally brought it into three dimensions, and showed the absurdity that this could ever be legitimate.
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End Bad Breath
Practitioner:
Seymour Chwast
Date:
Jun 5 1968
Wired Article:
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1
Flower People
Practitioner:
Dakotah Aiyanna
Date:
Dec 11 2020
“As a Black woman, I can grow absolutely anywhere," Aiyanna explains. "I can adapt to any storm, any weather, any changes. In the Black community, that's something that we're really good at.” So when Aiyanna, 25, was asked to contribute the first L in a Black Lives Matter mural made by a group of artists in downtown Charlotte, North Carolina, she knew her letter would include a flower person.
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French Farmers Throw Sh*t Fit
Practitioner:
FNSEA (National Federation of Agricultural Holders' Unions)
Date:
Dec 18 2023
"Energy costs surged with the Feb. 2022 launch by Russia of full-scale war in Ukraine and hit hard for farmers reliant on tractors, harvesters and other fuel-guzzling equipment. Prices also soared for other inputs that underpin intensive farming, notably fertilizers. French farmers were already struggling to compete in the increasingly globalized economy.
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Brazil to give $25 monthly culture stipend to workers to go to movies, read books or visit museums
Practitioner:
Brazilian Government
Date:
Jan 23 2013
BRASILIA (AFP).- Despite the economic crisis, Brazil announced Thursday it planned to give workers here a 50-real ($25) monthly stipend for cultural expenses like movies, books or museums. "In all developed countries, culture plays a key role in the economy," Culture Minister Marta Suplicy said in an interview on national television.
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Black Superheroes Matter
Practitioner:
Disney/Marvel Studios
Date:
Feb 16 2018
Watch Chadwick Boseman's Black Panther in Captain America: Civil War, and you'll see a charismatic character who fills a void in the conflicted do-gooder group. This T'Challa is accessible, awe-inspiring and perhaps most importantly, human. "I think the question that I'm trying to ask and answer in Black Panther is, 'What does truly mean to be African?'" the filmmaker recently told Rolling Stone.
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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.
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Ai Weiwei: Sunflower Seeds
Practitioner:
Ai Weiwei
Date:
Oct 12 2010
Ai Weiwei’s Sunflower Seeds is made up of millions of small works, each apparently identical, but actually unique. However realistic they may seem, these life-sized sunflower seed husks are in fact intricately hand-crafted in porcelain.
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Ai, Rebel: The Art and Activism of Ai Weiwei
Practitioner:
Ai Weiwei
Date:
Mar 12 2025
“Everything is art. Everything is politics.” Globally renowned artist Ai Weiwei (Chinese, b. 1957) is celebrated as a disruptor of artistic canons and a champion of free expression. In his work—ranging across performance, photography, sculpture, video, and installation—he deploys humor and provocation, calling upon his viewers to examine history, society, and culture.
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Sheep Storm Paris’ Louvre in Farmers Protest
Practitioner:
The Farmers Confederation
Date:
Mar 28 2014
Sheep stormed into Paris’ iconic Louvre museum on Friday (March 28) as farmers protested against reforms to the common agricultural policy (CAP). A dozen sheep ran into the museum’s entrance underneath its famous glass pyramid, baffling tourists and aggravating museum staff.
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Barack Obama “Hope” Poster
Practitioner:
Shepard Fairey
Date:
Jan 1 2008
Street artist, graphic designer, and activist Shepard Fairey created this visionary portrait of then Senator Barack Obama in 2008 as a form of grassroots activism to support Obama’s first presidential campaign. Fairey based the work on an Associated Press photograph by Mannie Garcia, which he transformed with his signature high-contrast stencil technique, inspired by the political message and bold graphics of Soviet Socialist Realism.
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Takeaways from J. Cole's New Album, KOD
Practitioner:
J. Cole
Date:
Apr 20 2018
In keeping with his activist turn on 2016’s 4 Your Eyez Only, J. Cole’s new album, KOD, is an exploration of addiction. The title has three different meanings that all speak to this aim: Kids On Drugs, King OverDosed, and Kill Our Demons. Each feeds into the next in this narcotic odyssey.
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5
Santorum
Practitioner:
Dan Savage, The Stranger
Date:
May 1 2003
"The campaign for the neologism "santorum" started with a contest held in May 2003 by Dan Savage, a columnist and LGBT rights activist. Savage asked his readers to create a definition for the word "santorum"[1][2] in response to then-U.S. Senator Rick Santorum's views on homosexuality, and comments about same sex marriage.
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Anibal Lopez-- One Ton of Books Dumped on Reforma Avenue
Practitioner:
Aníbal López
Date:
Jan 3 2003
Aníbal López, also known by his government identification number A-153167, is a pioneer of performance art in Central America. ArtBus describes his work as, "Generally aimed at immersing viewers into the region’s social and political tensions, his works combine the dry language of 1960/1970s conceptual art with the revolutionary ethos of a Latin American guerrillero.
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Dream Kites
Practitioner:
CultureStrike
Date:
Dec 12 2012
CultureStrike, the national arts and activism group, teamed up with undocumented youth and NY-based artist Miguel Luciano to hold a kite-based symbolic public art project in Washington D.C.
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Nazi control room reopens as Topography of Terror museum in Berlin
Practitioner:
Berlin Artist
Date:
May 6 2010
It was once the most feared address in Berlin, a place easy to enter but very hard to leave. Now the ruins of the former engine room of Nazi terror at Prinz Albrecht Strasse in Berlin have been preserved in a new exhibition space open to the public from tomorrow.
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Pilobolus Vote Project
Practitioner:
Pilobolus (Dance Company)
Date:
Oct 21 2012
The Pilobolus Dance company, famous for their beautiful aesthetics of shadow play formed out of the dancer's bodies, started the #PilobolusVOTEproject, encouraging people to form the words VOTE with whatever material they had around them, take a picture of it and to upload it on instagram with the hashtag #PilobolusVOTEproject.
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You Need to Calm Down
Practitioner:
Taylor Swift
Date:
Jun 17 2019
Everything You Need to Know About The Equality Act & Taylor Swift's Petition to Pass It In her latest song and music video for “You Need To Calm Down,” Taylor Swift is celebrating Pride the best way she knows how — by telling homophobic bigots to pipe down. Both in the video and in the song’s lyrics, the singer establishes herself as a clear ally to the community, singing “Shade never made anybody less gay.”
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Drawing the line: meet the Romanian artist-activist tackling world crises one cartoon at a time
Practitioner:
Dan Perjovschi
Date:
Jan 1 2016
Dan Perjovschi is one of Romania’s foremost artistic voices. Although known as a talented multi-disciplinary artist in his home country, particularly for his early performance work, he is most widely known internationally for his massive drawing installations.
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Hundreds Gather at Utah Capitol in Protest of New Transgender Rights Related Bills
Practitioner:
House Health and Human Services Committee, Equality Utah, Human Rights Commission, American Civil Liberties Union
Date:
Jan 25 2022
Lawmakers in a Utah House committee soundly rejected a bill that would have penalized doctors for giving gender-affirming health care to minors, then moments later approved legislation that included similar restrictions on transgender health care — minus the punishment — on party line during a lengthy committee meeting Tuesday.
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Project Black Mask HK
Practitioner:
Joyce Ho
Date:
May 28 2020
"Project Black Mask HK (PBMHK) was founded by a (then) 18-year-old, Joyce Ho, who is an American-born Hong Konger. On May 28, 2020, during a peak of the Coronavirus Pandemic, many people expressed frustration with their inability to protest on the streets (of the United States) in support of the freedom and democracy for Hong Kong. PBMHK became a space where people could do exactly that.
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Ai Weiwei on the project that awoke his political voice – The Start podcast
Practitioner:
Ai Weiwei
Date:
Feb 15 2018
In 2008, an earthquake devastated Sichuan province in China, claiming the lives of more than 69,000 people. Following accusations from parents that substandard construction caused the collapse of schools across in the region, the artist Ai Weiwei set upon a political investigation that would name every missing student and call the government to account for their deaths.
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