Protest art is the creative works produced by activists and social movements. It is a traditional means of communication, utilized by a cross section of collectives and the state to inform and persuade citizens. [1] Protest art helps arouse base emotions in their audiences, and in return may increase the climate of tension and create new opportunities to dissent. Since art, unlike other forms of dissent, takes few financial resources, less financially able groups and parties can rely more on performance art and street art as an affordable tactic. [1]
Protest art acts as an important tool to form social consciousness, create networks, operate accessibly, and be cost-effective. Social movements produce such works as the signs, banners, posters, and other printed materials used to convey a particular cause or message. Often, such art is used as part of demonstrations or acts of civil disobedience. These works tend to be ephemeral, characterized by their portability and disposability, and are frequently not authored or owned by any one person. The various peace symbols, and the raised fist are two examples that highlight the democratic ownership of these signs.
Protest art also includes (but is not limited to) performance, site-specific installations, graffiti and street art, and crosses the boundaries of Visual arts genres, media, and disciplines. While some protest art is associated with trained and professional artists, an extensive knowledge of art is not required to take part in protest art. Protest artists frequently bypass the art-world institutions and commercial gallery system in an attempt to reach a wider audience. Furthermore, protest art is not limited to one region or country, but is rather a method that is used around the world.
There are many politically charged pieces of fine art — such as Pablo Picasso's Guernica , some of Norman Carlberg's Vietnam War-era work, or Susan Crile's images of torture at Abu Ghraib.
It is difficult to establish a history for protest art because many variations of it can be found throughout history. While many cases of protest art can be found during the early 1900s, like Picasso's Guernica in 1937, the last thirty years[ when? ] has experienced a large increase in the number of artists adopting protest art as a style to relay a message to the public.
As awareness of social justices around the world became more common among the public, an increase in protest art can be seen. Some of the most critically effective artworks of the recent period[ when? ] were staged outside the gallery, away from the museum and in that sense, protest art has found a different relationship to the public.
Activist art represents and includes aesthetic, sociopolitical, and technological developments that have attempted to challenge and complicate the traditional boundaries and hierarchies of culture as represented by those in power. The aim of activist artists is to create art that is a form of political or social currency, actively addressing cultural power structures rather than representing them or simply describing them. [2] Like protest art, activist art practice emerged partly out of a call for art to be connected to a wider audience, and to open up spaces where the marginalized and disenfranchised can be seen and heard. It is important to note that Activist artists are not always your typical “artist.” Their works are individually created, and many of these individuals might not even consider themselves artists, but rather activists. [3] An example of activist artwork by someone who doesn't consider themselves to be an artist is a “Protester with Damien Hirst sign during the first week of Occupy Wall Street, September 2011.” This is someone who is using someone else's artwork but then adding a message in text over the work to address a political or social issue. An example of activist art where someone considers themself an artist is the work “Art Workers’ Coalition, circa 1971 (photo Mehdi Khonsari)” where Mehdi's message is that artwork's being connected to capitalism, and how artists are influenced and catering to the financial elites of the world. [4]
Activist art incorporates the use of public space to address socio-political issues and to encourage community and public participation as a means of bringing about social change. It aims to affect social change by engaging in active processes of representation that work to foster participation in dialogue, raise consciousness, and empower individuals and communities. The need to ensure the continued impact of a work by sustaining the public participation process it initiated is also a challenge for many activist artists. It often requires the artist to establish relationships within the communities where projects take place. Many active artists have been addressing the issue of climate change in their works, but this is just an example of one of many political artworks being created through activist art. [3]
If social movements are understood as “repeated public displays” of alternative political and cultural values, [5] then activist art is significant in articulating such alternative views. Activist art is also important to the dimension of culture and an understanding of its importance alongside political, economical, and social forces in movements and acts of social change. One should be wary of conflating activist art with political art, as doing so obscures critical differences in methodology, strategy, and activist goals.[ citation needed ]
Activist art cites its origins from a particular artistic and political climate. In the art world, performance art of the late 1960s to the 70s worked to broaden aesthetic boundaries within visual arts and traditional theatre, blurring the rigidly construed distinction between the two. Protest art involves creative works grounded in the act of addressing political or social issues. Protest art is a medium that is accessible to all socioeconomic classes and represents an innovative tool to expand opportunity structures. The transient, interdisciplinary, and hybrid nature of performance art allowed for audience engagement. The openness and immediacy of the medium invited public participation, and the nature of the artistic medium was a hub for media attention.[ citation needed ]
Emerging forms of feminism and feminist art of the time was particularly influential to activist art. The Feminist Art movement emerged in the early 60s during the second wave of feminism. Feminist artists worldwide set out to re-establish the founding pillars and reception of contemporary art. The movement inspired change, reshaped cultural attitudes and transformed gender stereotypes in the arts. [6] The idea that “the personal is the political,” that is, the notion that personal revelation through art can be a political tool, [7] guided much activist art in its study of the public dimensions to private experience. The strategies deployed by feminist artists parallel those by artists working in activist art. Such strategies often involved “collaboration, dialogue, a constant questioning of aesthetic and social assumptions, and a new respect for audience” [8] and are used to articulate and negotiate issues of self-representation, empowerment, and community identity.[ citation needed ]
Conceptual Art sought to expand aesthetic boundaries in its critique of notions of the art object and the commodity system within which it is circulated as currency. Conceptual artists experimented with unconventional materials and processes of art production. Grounded by strategies rooted in the real world, projects in conceptual art demanded viewer participation and were exhibited outside of the traditional and exclusive space of the art gallery, thus making the work accessible to the public. Similarly, collaborative methods of execution and expertise drawn from outside the art world are often employed in activist art so as to attain its goals for community and public participation. Parallel to the emphasis on ideas that conceptual art endorsed, activist art is process-oriented, seeking to expose embedded power relationships through its process of creation.[ citation needed ]
In the political sphere, the militancy and identity politics of the period fostered the conditions out of which activist art arose.[ citation needed ]
In practice, activist art may often take the form of temporal interventions, such as performance, media events, exhibitions, and installations. It is also common to employ mainstream media techniques (through the use of billboards, posters, advertising, newspaper inserts…etc.). By making use of these commercial distributive channels of commerce, this technique is particularly effective in conveying messages that reveal and subvert its usual intentions.
The use of public participation as a strategy of activating individuals and communities to become a “catalyst for change” is important to activist art. In this context, participation becomes an act of self-expression or self-representation by the entire community. Creative expression empowers individuals by creating a space in which their voices can be heard and in which they can engage in a dialogue with one another, and with the issues in which they have a personal stake.
The Artist and Homeless Collaborative is an example of a project that works with strategies of public participation as a means of individual and community empowerment. It is an affiliation of artists, arts professionals and women, children and teenagers living in NYC shelters, the A & HC believe that their work in a collaborative project of art-making offers the residents a “positive experience of self-motivation and helps them regain what the shelter system and circumstances of lives destroy: a sense of individual identity and confidence in human interaction.” [9] The process of engaging the community in a dialogue with dominant and public discourses about the issue of homelessness is described in a statement by its founder, Hope Sandrow: “The relevancy of art to a community is exhibited in artworks where the homeless speak directly to the public and in discussion that consider the relationship art has to their lives. The practice of creating art stimulates those living in shelters from a state of malaise to active participation in the artistic process” [9]
The A & HC came into being at a time when a critique of the makers, sellers, and consumers of art that addressed social concerns became increasingly pronounced. Critics argued that the very works of art whose purpose was to provoke political, social and cultural conversation were confined within the exclusive and privileged space of galleries museums, and private collections. By contrast, the A & HC was an attempt to bridge the gap between art production and social action, thus allowing for the work subjects that were previously excluded and silenced to be heard.
Resistance art is art used as a way of showing their opposition to powerholders. This includes art that opposed such powers as the German Nazi party, as well as that opposed to apartheid in South Africa. [10] The Soweto uprising marked the beginning of social change in South Africa. Resistance art grew out of the Black Consciousness Movement, a grass-roots anti-Apartheid movement that emerged in the 1960s led by the charismatic activist Steve Biko. Much of the art was public, taking the form of murals, banners, posters, t-shirts and graffiti with political messages that were confrontational and focused on the realities of life in a segregated South Africa. [11] Willie Bester is one of South Africa's most well known artists who originally began as a resistance artist. Using materials assembled from garbage, Bester builds up surfaces into relief and then paints the surface with oil paint. His works commented on important black South African figures and aspects important to his community. South African resistance artists do not exclusively deal with race nor do they have to be from the townships. Another artist, Jane Alexander, has dealt with the atrocities of apartheid from a white perspective. Her resistance art deals with the unhealthy society that continues in post-apartheid South Africa. [12]
"Humanitarian satire art" was a term introduced by author Lexa Brenner. This form of activist art uses seriocomedy, controversial images, and political statements. The works mock society and give the viewers the ability to interpret their works in many different ways. The majority of the works are built around the idea of promoting changes within society over current world issues. Works are usually left in hidden places, which citizens will eventually find. The majority of humanitarian satire artworks show political messages, most often alluding to controversial political messages, revolving around contemporary social issues. [13]
The Center for the Study of Political Graphics archive currently contains more than 85,000 posters and has the largest collection of post-World War II social justice posters in the United States and the second largest in the world. [14] Many university libraries have extensive collections including the Joseph A. Labadie Collection at University of Michigan documents the history of social protest movements and marginalized political communities from the 19th century to the present. [15]
Alternative media are media sources that differ from established or dominant types of media in terms of their content, production, or distribution. Sometimes the term independent media is used as a synonym, indicating independence from large media corporations, but generally independent media is used to describe a different meaning around freedom of the press and independence from government control. Alternative media does not refer to a specific format and may be inclusive of print, audio, film/video, online/digital and street art, among others. Some examples include the counter-culture zines of the 1960s, ethnic and indigenous media such as the First People's television network in Canada, and more recently online open publishing journalism sites such as Indymedia.
Internet activism involves the use of electronic-communication technologies such as social media, e-mail, and podcasts for various forms of activism to enable faster and more effective communication by citizen movements, the delivery of particular information to large and specific audiences, as well as coordination. Internet technologies are used by activists for cause-related fundraising, community building, lobbying, and organizing. A digital-activism campaign is "an organized public effort, making collective claims on a target authority, in which civic initiators or supporters use digital media." Research has started to address specifically how activist/advocacy groups in the U.S. and in Canada use social media to achieve digital-activism objectives.
The Black Arts Movement (BAM) was an African American-led art movement that was active during the 1960s and 1970s. Through activism and art, BAM created new cultural institutions and conveyed a message of black pride. The movement expanded from the incredible accomplishments of artists of the Harlem Renaissance.
Artivism is a portmanteau word combining art and activism, and is sometimes also referred to as Social Artivism.
Martha Rosler is an American artist. She is a conceptual artist who works in photography and photo text, video, installation, sculpture, and performance, as well as writing about art and culture. Rosler's work is centered on everyday life and the public sphere, often with an eye to women's experience. Recurrent concerns are the media and war, as well as architecture and the built environment, from housing and homelessness to places of passage and systems of transport.
Craftivism is a form of activism, typically incorporating elements of anti-capitalism, environmentalism, solidarity, or third-wave feminism, that is centered on practices of craft - or what has traditionally been referred to as "domestic arts". Craftivism includes, but is not limited to, various forms of needlework including yarn-bombing or cross-stitch. Craftivism is a social process of collective empowerment, action, expression and negotiation. In craftivism, engaging in the social and critical discourse around the work is central to its production and dissemination. Practitioners are known as craftivists. The word 'craftivism' is a portmanteau of the words craft and activism.
Josh MacPhee is an artist, curator, stonemason and activist living in Brooklyn, New York.
The Chicano Movement, also referred to as El Movimiento, was a social and political movement in the United States that worked to embrace a Chicano/a identity and worldview that combated structural racism, encouraged cultural revitalization, and achieved community empowerment by rejecting assimilation. Chicanos also expressed solidarity and defined their culture through the development of Chicano art during El Movimiento, and stood firm in preserving their religion.
Emerging from ACT UP in 1988, Gran Fury was an AIDS activist artist collective from New York City consisting of 11 members including: Richard Elovich, Avram Finkelstein, Amy Heard, Tom Kalin, John Lindell, Loring McAlpin, Marlene McCarty, Donald Moffett, Michael Nesline, Mark Simpson and Robert Vazquez-Pacheco.
Feminist art is a category of art associated with the feminist movement of the late 1960s and 1970s. Feminist art highlights the societal and political differences women experience in their lives. The goal of this art form is to bring a positive and understanding change to the world, leading to equality or liberation. Media used range from traditional art forms, such as painting, to more unorthodox methods such as performance art, conceptual art, body art, craftivism, video, film, and fiber art. Feminist art has served as an innovative driving force toward expanding the definition of art by incorporating new media and a new perspective.
Favianna Rodriguez is an American artist and activist known for her work in political posters and public art.
The Chicano Art Movement represents groundbreaking movements by Mexican-American artists to establish a unique artistic identity in the United States. Much of the art and the artists creating Chicano Art were heavily influenced by Chicano Movement which began in the 1960s.
Asco was an East Los Angeles based Chicano artist collective, active from 1972 to 1987. Asco adopted its name as a collective in 1973, making a direct reference to the word's significance in Spanish ("asco"), which is disgust or repulsion. Asco's work throughout 1970s and 1980s responded specifically to socioeconomic and political problems surrounding the Chicano community in the United States, as well the Vietnam War. Harry Gamboa Jr., Glugio "Gronk" Nicandro, Willie F. Herrón III and Patssi Valdez form the core members of the group.
subRosa is a cyberfeminist organization led by artists Faith Wilding and Hyla Willis.
Hip hop feminism is a sub-set of black feminism that centers on intersectional subject positions involving race and gender in a way that acknowledges the contradictions in being a black feminist, such as black women's enjoyment in hip hop music and culture, rather than simply focusing on the victimization of black women in hip hop culture due to interlocking systems of oppressions involving race, class, and gender.
Activism consists of efforts to promote, impede, direct or intervene in social, political, economic or environmental reform with the desire to make changes in society toward a perceived greater good. Forms of activism range from mandate building in a community, petitioning elected officials, running or contributing to a political campaign, preferential patronage of businesses, and demonstrative forms of activism like rallies, street marches, strikes, sit-ins, or hunger strikes.
Social practice or socially engaged practice in the arts focuses on community engagement through a range of art media, human interaction and social discourse. While the term social practice has been used in the social sciences to refer to a fundamental property of human interaction, it has also been used to describe community-based arts practices such as relational aesthetics, new genre public art, socially engaged art, dialogical art, participatory art, and ecosocial immersionism.
Interference Archive is a volunteer-run library, gallery, and archive of historical materials related to social and political activism and movements. Located in the Park Slope neighborhood of Brooklyn, New York City, at 314 7th Street, with in the zip code 11215, its mission is "to explore the relationship between cultural production and social movements."
Brandalism is an activist artist collective founded in 2012 in the United Kingdom which engages in subvertising, culture jamming, and protest art. Brandalism uses subvertising to alter and critique corporate advertising by creating parodies or spoofs to replace ads in public areas. The art is typically intended to draw attention to political and social issues such as consumerism and the environment. Advertisements produced by the Brandalism movement are silk screen printed artworks, and may take the form of a new image, or a satirical alteration to an existing image, icon or logo. The advertisements are often pasted over billboards, or propped under the glass of roadside advertising spaces.
Street art influence in politics refers to the intersection of public visual expressions and political discourse. Street art, including graffiti, murals, stencil art, and other forms of unsanctioned public art, has been an instrumental tool in political expression and activism, embodying resistance, social commentary, and a challenge to power structures worldwide.
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