Art and Activism - All in the Hands of the Viewer, Contemporary Lynx
Before members of the UN summit in 2003 sat down to debate whether or not to engage in a war against Iraq, the tapestry reproduction of ‘Guernica,’ which was usually the backdrop to events held in the building, was covered up. While the gesture was dismissed as a practical necessity, it still perfectly illustrates how Picasso’s activist gesture continues to hold power 80 years later.
These days, from protest banners and yarn bombing, to nailing your testicles to the Red Square, activism in the visual realm can take an infinite amount of forms. In the multitude of events that happened over the past year, and the causes that have been fought for around the world, art activism seems to have shifted closer towards the community, penetrating both the physical and online realms with an unflinching sense of mission.
2020 will no doubt be remembered as the year the pandemic shut down the world, yet it was also the year that injustices, inequalities and a lack of tolerance were laid bare for all to see — so much so that we could no longer stubbornly look away. The murder of George Floyd sparked a world-wide uprising against racism, the Polish government’s changes to abortion law forced generations of women to come out onto the streets, while not much further East, the falsified Belarusian election results caused widespread protests.
So what is art activism? A somewhat idealistic statement from the Center for Artistic Activism says that ‘art is a means by which to imagine the unimaginable, and artistic activism is the medium that can suggest it as a possibility.’ Activists strive for the blurring of lines between the real world and art in an effort to ascribe to their artistic actions a measurable outcome. This ranges from demanding changes to government regimes, to policy changes and reversals; salary increases for nurses, to racist attitude overhauls.
Despite popular opinion, activism doesn’t actually always happen on the street in a crowd of protesters. Perhaps it would be counter-intuitive to say that it can take place quietly within the confines of a white cube, but some images are powerful enough to transcend the boundaries that a gallery space imposes. Plus, the online realm now acts as both a never-ending display cabinet and a meeting space, so it’s safe to say that the web has become the primary way of experiencing art activism for the viewer, or at the very least, the site of the first encounter prior to a real life experience.
Now, let’s take a look at some critique: theorist Boris Groys talks about ‘the aestheticization and spectacularization of politics, including political protest’ being ineffective ‘because they divert attention away from the practical goals of political protest and towards its aesthetic form.’ He suggests that ‘art cannot be used as a medium of a genuine political protest—because the use of art for political action necessarily aestheticizes this action, turns this action into a spectacle and, thus, neutralizes the practical effect.’
We know that art requires attention to be experienced at all and through its very nature is a spectacle. But isn’t public resistance and protest a spectacle too, aimed at making visible the frustrations bubbling under the surface of a disaffected community? If so, it is hardly surprising that the two have joined forces. On the other hand, if measurable outcome really is the aim of art activism, can artists take their actions all the way to a tangible result or will they always fall short of achieving the values carried on banners? In his 1984 work ‘Distinction: A Social Critique of the Judgment of Taste,’ Pierre Bordieu stated that every creative activity is political –— regardless of whether it consists of production, consumption of the art, or simply taking part. More recently Artur Żmijewski, a leading force in the field of critical art, published his 2007 manifesto ‘Applied Social Arts’ in which he argued that art only has a purpose when it is a tool of social change. Similarly, Krzysztof Wodiczko talks about his work as “‘not political art”’ but ‘”politics. An artist can be a politician involved in the political discourse as someone who creates points, at which different types of statements meet. [The artist] is the catalyst who makes public space more saturated with politics.’
Jammie Holmes
In an action that can be described as the essence of activist gestures, on 30 May 2020 artist Jammie Holmes initiated public demonstrations across five American cities. In each of the cities, aeroplanes carrying banners with George Floyd’s last words flew above the protesters, each one carrying a short phrase: ‘Please I can’t breathe,’ ‘Everything hurts,’ ‘They’re going to kill me.’ Splitting the sentences across cities instead of repeating them suggested both a need for a unified response and the ubiquity of racially motivated violence. In his statement accompanying the piece, Holmes says that as a Black man, he’s been a victim of police misconduct a number of times — his personal experience amplifying the message that so many African-Americans know all too well.
Holmes’ statement also talks about the use of ‘sky media to recount Floyd’s final words presenting a contrast to the noise of digital media,’ especially because it is usually reserved for sporting events, marriage proposals and ‘unavailable to the poor and marginalized.’ Rather than creating work about the protests, the artist seized control over a privileged medium to create enormous protest banners in order to join and directly support the protesters on the ground at the height of the demonstrations. On the artist’s website we can find links to petitions and donation funds in support of the BLM cause, alongside free, printable copies of the banners’ photos available to download for use on march placards or at the very least, as reminders of the 2020 shift in public understanding of the mortal danger of continued white supremacy.
Anya Paintsil
Activist art also exists on the quieter end of the spectrum and Anya Paintsil’s textile works are an ideal example of a more intimate approach to the issue. The Welsh-Ghanaian artist uses her own memories and relationships with those closest to her to create large scale tapestries, woven in the mediums of latch hooking, rug punching, embroidery and braiding. Her piece ‘Anya or Anum’ (2020) recalls her childhood experiences of constantly being confused for another girl of colour in her school, with teachers treating them as the same person, the same other. Growing up in North Wales with little ethnic diversity — and being regularly faced with racist slurs — these beautiful pieces are Paintsil’s way of interrogating her own experiences and act as tools of resistance.
The artist’s technique is a crucial element of the work’s meaning. Learning the process of latch hooking from her grandmother at a young age, Paintsil describes her methods as very similar to afro hair styling: an art in its own right, with its history and traditions. Indeed, human hair is often used in her tapestries alongside yarn. Often seen as a frivolous activity, it exists despite being perceived as vanity or women’s work — not dissimilar to the attitudes that textile crafts as a whole still have to endure.
Paintsil herself states that her work started off as a means of personal protection and resistance, but has now become more about the community around it. She wants to capture the experience of the community for those going through similar journeys of battling through being misunderstood, unrepresented and overlooked.
Rufina Bazlova
Moving further East, joining the ‘activism through craft’ discourse is the work of Rufina Bazlova, a Belarusian artist living in Prague. The past year saw yet another presidential election in Belarus resulting in Alexander Lukashenko remaining in his leader’s seat, unchanged since 1994. The opposition leader Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya was driven out of the country and the Belarusian public saw no choice but to go out onto the streets and protest against this obvious injustice. This is when Bazlova started creating her characteristic red-and-white cross stitch embroideries based on the events she saw happening in her country.
The use of red and white relates to an earlier red-white flag of the Belarusian People’s Republic, which was formed in 1918, but absorbed into the Soviet Union a year later. The flag is now often used symbolically during protests and the use of colours is universally understood. Bazlova’s images depict events from the protests: clashes with the police; two DJs hijacking a pro-Lukashenko event by playing a song about the need for change; or women gathering around Tsikhanouskaya. The images resonated strongly with the online community and were widely shared on social media, with some people using them as symbolic profile pictures to show solidarity with the protesters.
Interestingly, using these images on social media leads to two possible outcomes -: non-action, due to the user’s performance of solidarity being seemingly enough, or a feeling of unity with the country for those who can’t directly take part in the protest. Nevertheless, while this type of work may not influence the outcome of the civic uprising, it gives the group a visual identity, something tangible to accompany them on the uncertain journey.
Marta Romankiv
Still on the topic of elections, but gathering a community in the physical realm, is Marta Romankiv. Ukraine-born but currently living in Poland, the artist shines a light on issues related to immigration.
Her project ‘IMMIGRANT, TAKE A VOTE!’ (2020) ran alongside Poland’s general elections in the summer of 2020. Romankiv invited immigrants to cast a symbolic vote using ballot cards provided in four languages, gathered in ballot boxes which would remain unopened yet filled with the voices of people who are bypassed in the current system. Despite Poland being a popular destination for hundreds of thousands of working migrants — most of them from Ukraine — there have been no reforms implemented which would simplify the process of assimilation and no efforts made to enable people to better participate in public life, of which voting is a prime example The artist’s ballot boxes manifested the need for a shift in the treatment and perception of immigrants, based on community and openness.
The action took places predominantly in galleries, immediately putting the initiative in a performative context, but this does not seem to take away from its message. One of the participants, Sasha Shenzi, talked about her experience of living in Poland after moving from Ukraine at the age of 11. Shenzi explained that she doesn’t usually follow politics and the inability to vote feels like the norm, but she’s recently started noticing a direct impact of the political landscape on her own life and feels increasingly helpless in her inability to influence anything about the country she’s living in. Casting a vote in Romankiv’s elections was the first time she marked her choice on a ballot card.
Providing a platform to gather genuine voices from the public is not a new activist -artist discovery, yet in the context of the increasingly nationalist tendencies and general hostility towards the other, the action makes real the possibility of a different future.
The Women’s Strike
The Women’s Strike (or Strajk Kobiet) has been a constant element of life in Poland since October of last year. Triggered by a tightening of the law in which the Constitutional Tribunal declared almost all cases of abortion illegal, people all over the country took to the streets to protest against the blatant breach of women’s rights.
While the events are still fresh in the national memory and the dust will certainly not settle any time soon, there can be no greater activist actions than the events themselves. The period of uprising provided fertile ground for graphic designers, illustrators and artists to produce imagery and banners strengthening the messages of the protesters, yet it would perhaps be too far removed from the protests themselves to stage an art event spotlighting a single artist. This was a community effort and should be acknowledged as such.
‘The Archive of Public Protest’ is an online repository documenting demonstrations staged in Poland since 2015 (when the current right-wing government was elected), in the form of images and texts. Documentation is more important than ever in a country where the ruling party is trying its utmost to extinguish independent thought and freedom of speech, therefore the archive serves as a crucial living resource. A common action on streets, recording events is now much more significant than openly reworking them in a gallery, and with the COVID-19 restrictions on galleries, an already limited audience would be even more reduced.
‘The year in protests’ was an outdoor exhibition of photographs taken during protests throughout 2020 (including LGBT+ people, environmentalists, BLM, farmers and unionists, alongside the Women’s Strikes) and displayed outdoors on advertising columns and in vitrines around Warsaw. The aim of the display was not to convince, but to remind and perhaps honour the places where the unrest took place. While photography is subjective, it is also the most readily available and necessary tool in recording events from one of the most memorable years of our lives, not only in Poland but all over the world. Similar protests were taking place in October in the US, prior to the presidential election. It is a shared, universal fight and its actions must be recorded for future generations.
Memes
We generally think of activism as aiming to expose injustice and working for the good of the people, but what happens when the greater good is perceived differently by a divided population? Memes are known for their comedic value, shared online millions of times every day, harmless bundles of fun that never stop coming. An updated version of a satirical cartoon, the proliferation of memes has made them an effective tool in swaying political opinion and pitting opposing sides against each other, as could be seen in the American presidential elections in 2016 and 2020.
In 2018, researchers studied 160 million memes to analyse their origin and found that the majority of popular images were first shared in alt-right or pro-Trump online spaces, such as 4chan and the self-described ‘politically incorrect’ forum r/pol on Reddit. These often toxic memes, like the image of Pepe the Frog adopted by white nationalists, had more shareable potential than any others in the study, suggesting that their content resonated enough with users for them to pass them on and, as a result, reached extremely high numbers of viewers.
Not authored by a single artist or even an organised group, the significance of memes in contemporary visual culture cannot be ignored. Described as “‘anarchic folk propaganda”,’ memes thrive on shareability and this can only be achieved by packaging nuance into extremely simplified images with short captions - both releasing frustrations that wouldn’t necessarily be better described in a four-page essay and leading to an incomplete understanding of the problem being mocked. While we cannot measure how many users engaging in this type of online activity cast a vote for Trump last year, the pervasiveness of the politically motivated meme cannot be understated.
Art activism today is not bound by a single definition and will undoubtedly come in many more forms in the future. One thing is certain: only those activist works and artists who succeed at assembling a community to follow their efforts will be successful. This is not a case of finding dedicated collectors or even curators, but of bringing art out of its confines and facilitating its encounter with as many participants as possible. Even then, it is up to the audience if, and how, they take forward the ideas they are met with through the medium of visual art, for that is the ultimate aim of the work. Deep and meaningful engagement that will eventually inspire action is the best outcome an activist can hope for.