*We would like to thank everyone who who participated in a very successful first Butterflies for Bealtaine*
For the month of May, we invited all ages to creatively respond to the theme of The Butterfly and to share a change they wish for on a personal, community or global level.
In Ireland as in many parts of the world we have been in a quarantine situation because of the global pandemic. This environment informed our project.
Photographer Donna Ferrato helped bring awareness to the epidemic of domestic violence in the United States through her raw and often graphic portraits of survivors of violence. But she fell into the work by accident after witnessing domestic violence firsthand.
The opening lines of this week’s Staff Pick Premiere, “Battleground,” by Kwesi Thomas and Mark Bone examine how skin color has become just that…a battleground. The short captures the particular discomfort of having to argue for one’s value in a society that should care instead of question. Kwesi, a Black man, powerfully conveys these feelings to his co-director Mark, a white man, in the wake of George Floyd’s death last May.
Google is honoring female artists and their stories this International Women’s Day.
On Thursday, the tech company will feature 12 interactive illustrations or “Google Doodles” on the search platform’s homepage. The artists are from 12 countries, including the U.S., Japan, Pakistan and Mexico.
Sari Red (1988), by Pratibha Parmar, is a visual poem. Made in memory of Kalbinder Kaur Hayre, a young Indian woman killed in 1985 in a racist attack in England, Sari Red eloquently examines the effect of the ever-present threat of violence upon the lives of Asian women in both private and public spheres.
Two members of the Yes Lab brought a dozen thrift-store suits to Zuccotti Park and asked for volunteers. Then, within earshot of the police, the group made a human microphone announcement about a "highly risky, very arrestable" action. Then, together with a brand-new police escort, the group headed towards the Wall Street Bull chanting "Castrate the bull!" and other angry slogans. More police joined.
Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelensky, French President Emmanuel Macron, Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk, and other top Western officials gathered on March 2 for a London summit to discuss support for Kyiv.
In this black-and-white image, there are no strands of hair or remnants of makeup to be found, except a shaved head belonging to a South Korean. Jeon photographed this image in 2019 for her exhibition that aimed to "destroy the socially defined idea of a woman” (Kuhn 1). The visuals in this image is a brazen response to the conventional beauty standards that has been gripping South Korean women.
FROM THE NEW YORK TIMES:
" While filming a documentary about divisive oil refinery ventures in the subzero cold of Fort McMurray, Alberta, the director David Dufresne said he wasn’t considering only pollution in that Canadian boomtown or the vast tar sands beneath its frozen ground. He was also thinking deeply about technology, about making a new kind of hybrid media, a docugame.
I met Antoine in 2012, when I first found out I was going deaf, and attended my first ASL Meetup in San Francisco. At that time I was only moderately hard of hearing (HOH), and had no idea what was to come. I didn't stay in the San Francisco Bay Area long to get too involved in the Deaf community.
In many of his works, the Belgian-Mexican conceptual and performance provocateur Francis Alÿs questions the relationship between action, effort, and outcome. His works tend to inspire one toward a blurring of lines between the actions done in artistic expression and those in social response, making the viewer question the value and effect of the toil.
The #LikeAGirl campaign was aired as a commercial during the 2015 SuperBowl. In the commercial, young girls were asked to act out certain phrases. They were told to "fight like girl", "throw a ball like a girl", "run like and girl", and so on. As an adolescent or an adult, these phrases carry a negative connotation. Girls are seen as weak, frilly, and inferior.
Angel Azul is an environmental documentary that follows the work of eco-sculptor Jason deCaires Taylor. Jason creates artificial coral reefs from statues he's cast from live models and installed on the ocean floor in an underwater museum off the coast of Cancún. The film explores issues that threaten the world's coral reefs which are suffering unprecedented losses.
“Nude” and “vulnerable” aren’t words commonly used to describe Arab males. But that’s how Tamara Abdul Hadi pictures them—literally—in the project Picture an Arab Man. With the goal of breaking the stereotype of Arab men as violent and dangerous, Abdul Hadi has traveled during the past three years to countries including Egypt, Palestine, and Yemen to photograph semi-naked men.
What is it like living with AIDS? This heart-wrenching video for South Africa’s Topsy Foundation brings us through 90 hard days in the life of someone living with it. Be sure to watch it all the way to the end. It’s worth it:
Did you catch that? If you didn’t, watch it again. Spoiler after the jump.
Rage Against the Machine have always been rabble rousers, but the political statement that got them banned from Saturday Night Live sounds positively prosaic compared to other acts of protest they committed in their heyday, like shutting down the New York Stock Exchange or sporting a "Free Mumia Abu-Jamal" shirt on live television.
The Youth Activist Art Archive (YAAA) is a dedicated platform that highlights and celebrates the creative efforts of young individuals (26 years old and younger) actively participating in diverse social movements and causes. YAAA acknowledges the vital role and innovative vision of young activists who employ their artistic talents to envision and advocate for a brighter future.
New Beijing, New Marriage is a documentary shot by Fan Popo, a Chinese gay rights activist in 2009. The film recorded that a gay couple and a lesbian couple, who were volunteers instead of real homosexual couples, were having their wedding photos taken at Qianmen Street on Valentine’s Day. Qianmen Street is a crowded and famous shopping street in Beijing.
Herself.com may not be safe for work, but it FEELS safe for work. That's how intimate and gorgeous the shots of these naked women are, they transcend, for some, the feeling that you are looking at the taboo. You are simply looking at a person, in a quality of artistry that you might not be used to seeing on what are deemed "regular people".
A photography project on China's marriage market has recently reignited the debate about marriage in China, and the phenomenon of women deemed too old to marry, or "leftover women" in the country.
A Straight Journey is a documentary of Chinese homosexual people. It is the first time for Chinese gays and lesbians to make their debut and speak out via one of the largest Chinese Internet service providers. Two Chinese photographers Masa and Mojo took a journey across 11 China's cities making portraits of 48 gays, lesbians and their families from 2014-2015.
A new series of video commentaries with Davey Drumpf, The Donald's long-lost third cousin, twice removed. His views are several degrees to the Left of the Don's. First installment: Co-housing vs. Weaponized Xenophobia.
Taken from the website:
Dyke Action Machine! (DAM!) is a two-person public art project founded in 1991 by artist Carrie Moyer and photographer Sue Schaffner. Between 1991 and 2004 DAM! blitzed the streets of New York City with public art projects that combined Madison Avenue savvy with Situationist tactics.