Step into the captivating world of Zanele Muholi, the activist and masterful photographer from South Africa. Through their lens, they unveil the realities found within LGBTQI+ stories, challenging norms and reshaping perceptions of beauty. Each intimate and evocative portrait captured by Muholi becomes a vessel for social change, dismantling stereotypes, and amplifying the voices of those historically silenced.
Call it art, exhibited as an installation piece in the October 2014 show "Crossing Brooklyn," a collaboration of more than 100 artworks by 35 artists (or groups) who live or work in Brooklyn, presented at the Brooklyn Museum... or call it "A survey of Art from Brooklyn" as hyperallergic journalist Jillian Steinhauer wrote... it exists on the streets as a social practice, albeit using creative means for community-building.
In 2007, anonymous French photographer JR embarked on the Face2Face project - the largest unauthorized photo exhibition ever conceived. JR and his collaborator Marco engaged Israelis and Palestinians employed in the same profession to be photographed making funny faces. They then enlarged the photos to grand proportions and wheat pasted juxtaposed portraits onto both sides of the security Separation Wall and in surrounding cities.
Walking the rows of shoes—favorite slippers, old Army boots, gold stilettos—it’s the baby shoes that stop you cold. Shoes began to fill a plaza opposite Puerto Rico’s Capitol building, and by Sunday morning, there were more than 3,000 pairs, a growing memorial to the roughly 4,645 people estimated to have died in the aftermath of Hurricane Maria.
In 1996, filmmaker John Akomfrah created the character of the Data Thief as a narrative device to offer an insightful study of Afrofuturism in his film The Last Angel of History, which links Black musicians including George Clinton, Derrick May, and Sun Ra to Akomfrah’s thesis about the role of technological fantasy in Black artistry across genres and mediums.
ODBK is an activist organization that aims to create a more equal, diverse, inclusive, transparent and democratic art world. ODBK seeks to do this by diversify and increase the number of people who understand and engage with contemporary art.
Oakland-based artist-activists Melanie Cervantes and Jesus Barraza teamed up to form Dignidad Rebelde, a graphic arts collaboration working for social change. They believe that art can be an empowering reflection of
community struggles, dreams and visions, and following principles of
Xicanisma and Zapatismo, create work that translates people’s stories
“My intention was not to disappear in the environment but instead to let the environment take possession of me” Said Liu Bolin. With his strong photography, Bolin vanishes into the city, creating a powerful statement about our relationship, as humans, to our surroundings.
New York performance artist Matthew Silver is at it again. In his most recent stunt he reminded people that self love can't be achieved through commodities. Chanting "You don't need stuff to love yourself" in his underwear at Columbus Circle he created a spectacle that attracted more and more people to his message.
Shocking images have emerged purporting to be of an emaciated physician on a hunger strike while jailed in Iran for supporting women protesting the hijab law. Swedish-Iranian Dr. Farhad Meysami, 53 — who began his hunger strike on Oct. 7 to protest the killing of demonstrators by the Islamic Republic — was purported to be the man seen in skin-and-bone photos that have gone viral on social media.
In Tunisia, a country gripped by economic uncertainty and still in the midst of rebuilding its identity after the Arab Spring, hip-hop culture is viewed as part of an ongoing dissident movement. Just a few events, such as the recent Mafia Wallitili Festival in the heart of downtown Tunis, offer the local hip-hop community an opportunity to share their values with the broader population.
A trio of far-right, pro-gun provocateurs is behind some of the largest Facebook groups calling for anti-quarantine protests around the country, offering the latest illustration that some seemingly organic demonstrations are being engineered by a network of conservative activists.
Mine is not Arts for the sake of Arts. It is a revolutionary INSGINA carved into the artistic plaque of my DNA to speak FREEDOM of expression and then freedom after EXPRESSION. The footprints of my revolutionary walk are dipped in the paths of RESISTANCE. My Ideological Swag -word is CREATIVITY. My spiritual birth mark is RESILIENCE. My revolutionary slogan is a nonviolent but a poetic fist of MASS INSTRUCTION. I am non-selfish believer.
SomeGoodNews is a Youtube channel started by actor John Krasinski. The videos in the channels are aimed at discussing and sharing good news happening these days. The channel was set up as a way to help alleviate the mental health strain the COVID-19 epidemic has had on many people.
Kwentong Bayan: Labour of Love is a community based comic book project, created by Toronto-based artists Althea Balmes (Illustrator) and Jo SiMalaya Alcampo (Writer) in close collaboration with caregivers and supporters, about the real life stories of Filipina migrant workers in the Live-in Caregiver Program.
In Cape Town, South Africa the design firms Design Indaba Trust and Thinking have teamed up with artist Faith47 to help raise funds to bring more light to their urban city. Their goal is to raise funds to light up 700 meters of Manwabisi Park, which will ultimately reduce the crime rate in the area through more light. In order to get the community involved in the project, they have combined street art with community engagement.
A group of Chicago youth staged a “die-in’ at City Hall to demand that the city defund police and fund marginalized communities instead. The youth, all members of #NoCopAcademy, also announced that the organization is suing Mayor Rahm Emanuel for withholding critical emails regarding construction of the proposed $95 million building for a Police and Fire training center in West Garfield Park.
Ghana ThinkTank is an international collective that “develops the first world” by flipping traditional power dynamics, asking the “third world” to intervene into the lives of the people living in the so-called “developed” world.
A new, three-minute ad by Coca-Cola, "Small World Machines," starts with a relatively straightforward premise: India and Pakistan do not get along so well. It ends with the promise of peace: "Togetherness, humanity, this is what we all want, more and more exchange," a woman, either Indian or Pakistani, narrates as the music swells. Sounds great. How do we get there? By buying Coke, of course.
"What I Couldn't Say in Public" transforms individual secrets into a public, anonymous spectacle.
While origins and exact location of the "What I Couldn't Say in Public" project are unknown, awareness about the project has grown over the micro-blogging platform of Tumblr. Amassing over 132,480 notes on the website, this practice may have possibly inspired others to imitate the same or similar projects in different locations.