What is Activism?
Activism is an action or policy where people are campaigning to bring about change whether it's political or social. In the New Jersey Institute of Social Justice, they use cutting-edge racial and social justice advocacy to empower and support people of color by building systems that creates wealth, transform justice and harness democratic power. Mr. Mustart and Orlando Cuevas are artists from the Constellations Exhibit who are politically aware and developed their sense of activism in art in NJCU. In Lee Hagan Africana Studies Center, Dr. Lee Hagan Africana was a committed scholar activist who devoted her teaching and research of African American history and culture.
What is Art Activism?
Art Activism is where people use their creative practices, whether they use painting, performance, or writing, to share their ideas, spread awareness for social and political issues, and take action for change. People can use poetry for activism too, according to Audre Lorde.
WAR ON SMOG
This artwork consists a couple in a wedding attire, wearing smog masks. This is a portrayal of street performers in Chongqing city, advocating against the smog. They are addressing the situation of air pollution that it is commonly happening in China, with street performances and non-confrontational protests.
"The problem with socialism is that it wastes too many evenings on meetings." - Oscar Wilde
"Poetry is the way we help give name to the nameless so it can be thought." - Audre Lorde
Response: What Oscar meant is that having excessive deliberation and too much bureaucracy would make socialist efforts a waste of time and ineffective. In the article, Activism is foreign to many people and it seems to be taking too much commitment, risks, and too much time, which means it would be ineffective. I could agree with Audre Lorde, because Poetry can be used in protest since it can share ideas with other people, spread awareness, and take action for social or political change.
"Courbet was involved with the Paris Commune of 1871, a socialist government that only lasted about two months. His involvement resulted in Courbet’s imprisonment and his subsequent death in exile."
"One example is the anonymous artist group called the Guerrilla Girls, who became famous in the 1980s for their feminist, activist art which publicly questioned the male-dominated and sexist art world."
Response: What the 1st quote was referring to was Courbet's art portrayal of the life and harsh conditions of the lower class. His goal was to start a protest, a movement, where they have to change the system for the lower class to have better working conditions. The 2nd quote is talking about the Guerrilla Girls, since their art publicly questioned the male-dominated and sexist art world. They made this art to fight for equality and feminism.
"During the Jim Crow era, Black people were terrorized by lynching … It was a threat that hung over all Black people who knew that for any reason or no reason whatsoever you could be killed and the killers would never be brought to justice. Now the police are playing the same role of terror that lynch mobs did at the turn of the century." - Dread Scott.
"I remember even former Mayor Koch, who had a radio show, accused the museum of fascism because he said we forced people to wear badges that declared that being white was no good. People just had completely bizarre readings of that piece. That piece became a real lightning rod." - David Ross
Response: I feel worried on what happened on that event. He brought up his own version of the flag as a response to the fatal shooting of Walter Scott by a South Carolina police officer. He explains about Jim Crow era and said that the police are doing the same on what the mobs did back then. As for David Ross, he is referring to the public controversy in the Whitney Museum of American Art and the art itself that was made by Daniel J. Martinez, where former Mayor Koch accused the museum of fascism.
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