Projects tagged "United States"

Art Cannot Provide a Way Out
Practitioner:
Claire Bishop
Date:
Aug 1 2012
In 2006, art historian Claire Bishop lit a fire under the collective seat of the art world with her Artforum piece “The Social Turn: Collaboration and its Discontents.” It set off — as much as any essay in the hermetic and staid world of contemporary art theory can — an uproar. The article inspired Grant Kester, an art historian also specializing in relational art practices, to respond:
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Amazon May Day Strike
Practitioner:
Amazon Employees
Date:
May 1 2020
Essential workers at major companies like Amazon, Instacart, and Target across the United States on Friday protested for better safety protections, working conditions, and pay during the coronavirus pandemic.
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The AIDS Memorial Quilt— NAMES Project
Practitioner:
Elizabeth Taylor
Date:
Jan 1 1980
The AIDS pandemic began in the early 1980s and brought with it a surge of emotions from the public: they were afraid, angry, fearful and defiant. The arrival of AIDS also brought with it a condemnation of the LGBT community. These emotions, along with the view on the LGBT community, paved the way for a new generation of artists.
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White Noise Documentary Film
Practitioner:
The Atlantic
Date:
Jun 20 2020
"White Noise explores the seductive power of extremism. Hatred feels good. But the fix is fleeting. As the film progresses, the subjects reveal the contradictions at the heart of their world. Lauren Southern advocates for traditional gender roles, but resents the misogyny and sexism of her peers. Mike Cernovich warns that “diversity is white genocide,” but has an Iranian wife and biracial kids.
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Project 562: Changing the way we see Native America
Practitioner:
Matika Willbur
Date:
Feb 16 2014
Matika Willbur was given a grant by Kickstarter (the worlds largest funding platform for creative projects) to travel around the U.S. for a year and photograph Native America. The goal of the 562 project is to change the way we think of the Native American race, by shifting our collective consciousness and creating a positive lasting legacy of Native America.
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Food Inc.
Practitioner:
Participant Media, River Road Entertainment, Magnolia Pictures
Date:
Jul 31 2009
Food Inc. By Peter Travers
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Day after Debt
Practitioner:
Ahmet Ögüt
Date:
Nov 23 2014
The artist conceived the project as a collaborative exhibition featuring five art-as-response pieces to the student loan crisis and the pressure it causes upon graduates. In its original version, Öğüt invited Natascha Sadr Haghighian, Superflex, Dan Perjovschi, Martha Rosler to present sculptures as collection points for public contribution to The Debt Collective, a student-debt canceling initiative launched by Strike Debt's Rolling Jubilee.
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Brick X Brick
Practitioner:
Public Displays of Affection
Date:
Jan 21 2018
Brick x Brick is a public art performance that builds human “walls” against misogyny. It is organized by the Public Displays of Affection, a collective of artists, designers, educators and organizers that engages in nonviolent direct art action. During the wall performances, participants wear brick-patterned jumpsuits adorned with colorful brick patches bearing statements of misogynistic violence made by US President Donald Trump.
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Subversive Coloring Books
Practitioner:
various
Date:
Jan 1 1961
While adult coloring books are hitting a high note right now in 2016, this isn't the first time this has happened. Back in the 1960s, coloring books were so popular that one of them even made it to the New York Times bestseller list. However, while modern adult coloring books are very geometric and abstract, intended to help adults destress and relax, adult coloring books from the 1960s were much more political.
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“Untitled” (Portrait of Ross in L.A.)
Practitioner:
Felix Gonzalez-Torres
Date:
Jan 24 1991
Felix Gonzalez-Torres produced meaningful and restrained sculptural forms out of common materials. “Untitled” (Portrait of Ross in L.A.) consists of an ideal weight of 175 pounds of shiny, commercially distributed candy. The work’s physical form and scale change with each display, affected by its placement in the gallery as well as audience interactions.
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#LikeAGirl
Practitioner:
Lauren Greenfield
Date:
Feb 15 2015
The #LikeAGirl campaign was aired as a commercial during the 2015 SuperBowl. In the commercial, young girls were asked to act out certain phrases. They were told to "fight like girl", "throw a ball like a girl", "run like and girl", and so on. As an adolescent or an adult, these phrases carry a negative connotation. Girls are seen as weak, frilly, and inferior.
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Julius Eastman: Gay Guerilla
Practitioner:
Julius Eastman
Date:
Jun 4 1980
Julius Eastman was a Black and Queer avant garde, minimalist composer and performer from the 1960s-1980s. He used his platform to advocate for the rights and livelihoods of Black and queer people through his unique musical aesthetic and the controversial naming of his pieces, including "Gay Guerrilla," "Evil N-word" and "Crazy N-Word"
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Walk in Their Shoes
Practitioner:
CODEPINK
Date:
Jul 24 2008
"Hundreds of children's shoes create stunning memorial of Iraqi children dead through war.
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United States of Attica
Practitioner:
Faith Ringgold
Date:
Sep 15 1971
In September 1971, after years of mistreatment and months of simmering tensions, more than 1,200 of the 2,200 inmates at the Attica Correctional Facility in upstate New York took control of the prison in protest of its substandard conditions and openly racist corrections officers.
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Art, Politics, Activism, Oakland And Angela Davis
Practitioner:
Angela Davis
Date:
Jan 19 2023
In Oakland, artists created murals and installations to honor activist Angela Davis, celebrating her legacy in fighting for racial and gender justice. These public artworks inspire new generations to continue the struggle for social change.
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Cheering Girls into STEM
Practitioner:
Science Cheerleader
Date:
Jan 30 2015
Despite the pushes to motivate more young girls into STEM (science, technology, engineering, and math) fields, women are still very underrepresented in almost every scientific field. Part of this motivation is because a lot of young girls would rather do something else.
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Music that Propelled the Indigenous Rights Movement
Practitioner:
Buffy Sainte-Marie
Date:
Aug 3 1969
"The Red Power Movement of the 1960s and 70s was a time of profound social change and progress for American Indians in the United States and Canada. In her outspokenness about the injustices facing Indigenous people, Buffy Sainte-Marie also sang for peace, the environment, women and children—believing that art can have impact and make a difference.
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Abercrombie and Fat
Practitioner:
Jes Baker
Date:
May 20 2013
Jes Baker, 26, created a campaign called Abercrombie and Fat in response to the CEO of Abercrombie and Fitch. In 2006, the CEO released a statement that his target consumer is the cool, All American kid who has a lot of friends. He continues to say that his business is exclusive and a lot of people do not belong in his clothes.
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MESOAMÉRICA RESISTE
Practitioner:
Beehive Collective
Date:
Jul 16 2019
The Beehive Design Collective is a wildly motivated, all-volunteer, activist arts collective dedicated to “cross-pollinating the grassroots” by creating collaborative, anti-copyright images for use as educational and organizing tools. We work as word-to-image translators of complex global stories, shared with us through conversations with affected communities.
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Sleep Out
Practitioner:
Covenant House
Date:
Feb 2 2021
Covenant House has started a ‘Sleep Out’ movement that shines light on the youth homelessness crisis and raises funds for young people who seek shelter. "Covenant House empowers young people to overcome homelessness and trafficking by providing them with safe housing, food and clothing, and relentless support. Sleep Out events are held for people who want to join the movement as they give up their bed for one night in NYC.
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American Indian artist Brian Larney uses a mix of art, activism to chronicle Indigenous history
Practitioner:
Brian Larney
Date:
Dec 26 2022
Brian Larney is an AI.tivist or American Indian artist. He is also an Artivist where he performs Artivism, a concept that includes art as a form of activism.
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The Occult Activism of 1960s Group WITCH is Still Relevant
Practitioner:
WITCH
Date:
Jan 1 1960
When people think of feminist protests of the 1960s, they most often think of bra burning at the Miss America pageant. This is super lame because bras weren’t even burned at that protest, just discarded into a trash can. It’s hard to imagine why this trope has persisted over the decades. Bras are an investment, so I have a hard time believing that any of my friends would willingly burn expensive (and sometimes really fun) garments.
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Citizen Four
Practitioner:
Laura Poitras
Date:
Oct 24 2014
"CITIZENFOUR is a real life thriller, unfolding by the minute, giving audiences unprecedented access to filmmaker Laura Poitras and journalist Glenn Greenwald’s encounters with Edward Snowden in Hong Kong, as he hands over classified documents providing evidence of mass indiscriminate and illegal invasions of privacy by the National Security Agency (NSA).
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The New York Times Special Edition
Practitioner:
Steve Lambert, The Yes Men, Not an Alternative!, CODEPINK, Packard Jennings, May First/People Link, Improv Everywhere, Joseph DeLappe, L.M. Bogad, FAIR, Stephen Duncombe
Date:
Nov 9 2008
On November twelfth, 2008, over 80,000 copies of a replica of the New York Times were distributed in several cities around the United States. The paper included 14 pages of “best case scenario” news set nine months in the future. See the The New York Times Special Edition website.
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Guide for Youth Protestors
Practitioner:
Jessalyn Aaland
Date:
Jan 1 2017
The project consists of a double-sided, hand-drawn 8.5" x 11" quarter-fold sheet available to print and distribute freely. It features such topics as basic information on police tactics (kettling, LRADS, tear gas or pepper spray), ways cops might try to get you to talk to them, and your rights as a student.
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