Art Against Political Repression

Under political repression dissenters lose the freedom to talk openly about problems or question authority.
In extreme cases even the protest art must take a form where it will not attract the wrong attention.  Arpilleras (pronounced ar-pee-air-ahs) are a great example.


Art Against Political Repression presentation      (Arpillera images from facinghistory.org)

Activist art can also be performative and still be "underground".
For Chilean women under Pinochet's regime, the La cueca, (pronounced kewk-ah) a popular courtship dance, was performed in a unique way as a protest.

What else can we learn about Civil Society from this?
Where does freedom of expression and association come into play?
What is the buffer between you and the government?
Are there ways for you to shape culture, politics and economy other than voting?

Homework due Thursday: 
                     a) Comb through sources for current events and come up with 10 issues of concern. 
                     b) Of these, select the one that you feel most strongly about.
                     c) List three things that would have to happen to resolve this issue.
Post your lists on the blog or email them to me.

Civil Society

Due Thursday-

1) in the comments field, enter examples of things, people, groups or other entities which exist (or could exist) within the field of Civil Society.

2) CEC writeups on a piece of political or activist art from one of the Berrie Center exhibitions (writeup guidelines here in original description of assignment).

Sexual Politics part two

Visual Symbols in Activist Art

 

Sexual Politics Protest Images

HIV Activism

Sexual Politics part one

Design: Visual Choices Made By Activist Artists

We'll start with the suffrage movement as a way to lunch ourselves toward the present, taking into consideration all issues of sexuality and equality.

Read the Demilio article on Sexual Politics (spend at least two hours reading, looking up terms, considering tangents)
Respond to the article by sketching a poster design on 8.5 x 11 paper. You can create your design using software, or by sketching. I'm looking for the ideas present in the image though you may also use text.

Poster design Due Monday Feb 20

Culture Jamming and Pre-Jamming

Culture Jamming Presentation

Homework due Monday (look at blog entry from Monday for instructions)


CEC #1  Political Meeting: Due March 22
-Attend your proposed political meeting.
-While there, think of a question to ask that is important to you (and one that cannot be answered via internet research)
-Ask the question or email the question to the appropriate board member following the meeting
-To get CEC credit, CC me on the email you send, containing your question

CEC #2 Kresge and Pascal Galleries: "From the Mezzanine" and  " A Journey Into the Spirit World: Selections from the Heloise and Martin Ruskin Collection"  Due Thurs Feb 23
-In either exhibition, look for an artwork that could be considered protest art, activist art, or art created to provoke a specific political or social change.
-Identify the issue and use our Writing About Exhibition Guidelines for writing your CEC critique.
-To get CEC credit, email me your written critique as a PDF.

Trickster Artists and Culture-Jamming

 
The trickster is a boundary crosser and a speaker of profanities. He is the “mythic embodiment of ambiguity and ambivalence, doubleness and duplicity, contradiction and paradox”.
The trickster can “bring to the surface a distinction previously hidden from sight”.
He disrupts and reshapes the world around him.

Robin Rhode as Trickster
Barbie Liberation Organization
Jonah Peretti tangles with Nike

For next Monday:
Find 3 artists who use trickster methods. Email me their work as a PDF or slide show with one image of each example, captions for each image, and one sentence for each image describing what the artwork is reacting to, or how it is meant to affect or engage viewers.

Dada - Origins of Trickster Art

Dada Presentation

Dada is a cultural movement that started in Switzerland during WWI.
Visual arts, literature, thater, graphic design, and concentrated it's anti-war though a rejection of the status quo, especially against the prevailing standards of art, and against traditional easthetics.
These works were a protest against the bourgeois nationalist and colonialist interests which many Dadaists believed were the root cause of the war.