The political artist I chose to investigate is Ruth Peche, a Spanish sculptor and photographer. Her themes tend to center around plastic waste and the impact it has on the environment, using this as a muse for describing the relationship human society has with the natural world. Peche’s interest in art activism, particularly with themes of preserving the environment, is something that was sparked for her in during her childhood years.
In July and August 2013, O Teatrão, a Coimbra based theatre company, presented the project Arruinados, comprising three theatre performances in three abandoned spaces (‘ruins’), one in each of three cities in the Centre region of Portugal located along the Mondego River:Coimbra, Montemoro Velho, and Figueira da Foz.
The language of music is common to all generations and nations,” Gioachino Rossini, the virtuosic opera composer, once said. “It is understood by everybody, since it is understood with the heart.” In recent weeks, Italians have embraced the language of music as a means to communicate with their neighbors and endure the ravages of covid-19 as a collective.
When Tracey Emin aired her dirty laundry in the 1999 Turner Prize exhibition at Tate Britain, she set a new standard for confessional art. She conceived of the installation, titled My Bed (1998), after a long, bedridden bender following a bad break-up. When Emin finally left her sheets, she examined the mess she’d created.
Cyclist activists from the Koce, Return to the Street initiative set up sculptures symbolically showing the marginalization of cyclists in the city, the inadequate and dysfunctional infrastructure for this means of transport, but also to point out the large number of trampled bikers in Skopje.
Gender equality charity Women of the World (WOW) is launching a one-day festival of activism that invites people from all generations, genders and backgrounds to take part in conversations around sexual violence.
World Microphone (世界麦克风) is an organization created by students (most of them are Chinese) located in London. The organization has an account in RED, which is a popular social media in China. It often holds interviews and movements on the street in London, talking about world culture, food, and travel. Then, it makes short videos based on these interviews and movements and posts the videos on RED.
The 15M movement in Spain grew out of a desire for liberation and greater access to social and political rights for marginalized groups. At its core the activists of 15M were visionaries and used voting for a utopian society as a creative act to reimagine the world they created. Reality is socially construed by the forces that determine individual agency.
Luzinterruptus turns their art activism towards the overabundance of dog doo littering the city’s streets.
The studio inflated 500 poop-scoopin' plastic bags and placed a lightbulb inside each one.
Installation lasted nine hours.
At 7:00 PM on 23 August 1989, approximately two million people from Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania joined hands, forming a human chain from Tallinn through Riga to Vilnius, spanning 675 kilometres, or 420 miles. It was a peaceful protest against the illegal Soviet occupation and also one of the earliest and longest unbroken human chains in history.
What the Skirt Lifts is a day long protest against gender discrimination initiated by student Arthur Moinet and sanctioned by the Académie de Nantes, made up of local school officials. Both male and female students were encouraged to school wearing skirts. Those who did not feel comfortable wearing skirts were invited to participate by wearing a sticker which read: I am fighting against sexism, are you?
Throughout the Lodi district of Milan, Italy, artist Biancoshock has transformed abandoned manholes into miniature subterranean rooms. Beneath the pavement, in vacant maintenance vaults, a cupid painting in a gaudy frame hangs in a tiny pink living room; a boxy kitchen is stocked with pots and pans; and a blue-tiled bathroom is complete with shower and towel.
In May of 2011, tens of thousands of people crowded Puerta del Sol in the center of Madrid in the most visible manifestation of sit-in protests against austerity and corruption. 15-M was an expression of the devastating effects of the 2008 recession, which harshly affected the middle class and condemned millions of people to poverty because of the crash of the housing bubble (Altares, 2021).
ACE Bank was a hoax bank developed as part of a bigger campaign by Netwerk Vlaanderen, a Belgian organization concerned with banks’ responsibilities for what they invest in. ACE bank was an elaborate deception, with a headquarters in central Brussels, parodying other banks. It claimed to be investigating whether there was a market for its special way of doing business.
The 1975’s ‘Love It If We Made It’ is a dystopian love story that feels appropriate for the last 18 months. Even though it was written before the pandemic, its relevancy has only increased tenfold since its release in 2018.
Massimiliano Martigli Jiang was born in Wenzhou, China but moved with his parents to Italy when he was still a child. The 29 year-old grew up in Italy and considers himself as much Italian as Chinese.
With an estimated four million surveillance cameras, Britain is by far the most-watched nation on earth. Every Londoner is on camera about 300 times a day. How could this come about in George Orwell’s mother country? What were the ignition sparks for this development? Why haven’t other nations copied the schemes if they really are as successful as the Home Office and the police are saying?
Orquesta Solfónica de Madrid
The Orquesta Solfónica de Madrid (Solphonic Orchestra of Madrid) is a self-organized orchestra that was formed in the context of the social movement 15M and that has gained popularity for playing classical music in demonstrations and acts of social protest.
Trampoline House is a user-driven refugee justice community center located in the center of Copenhagen, where refugees, asylum seekers, and migrants can meet with Danish citizens and other residents of Denmark and share experiences, learn from one another, and work to create a more just and sustainable refugee and asylum policy.
The Brat Summer movement can be directly traced back to the release of Charli XCX's album "Brat" in 2024. Known for her boundary-pushing pop sound and fierce persona, Charli XCX used "Brat" as a platform to explore themes of defiance, self-empowerment and the rejection of societal expectations.
A collective endeavor of Greek antiquity — no less than eighty different artists worked on the frieze alone — the Parthenon was built between 447 BC and 438 BC under the orders of Pericles, following a democratic debate, and overseen by the sculptor Phidias. It measures ten meters high and approximately seventy meters long by thirty meters wide.
Ali Ferzat, the daring political cartoonist from Syria, fearlessly wields his pen as a powerful weapon against oppressive regimes. His illustrations pierce through the fabric of authoritarianism, revealing the raw truth that lies beneath. Despite facing unimaginable brutality, Ferzat's indomitable spirit remains unyielding.
Greenpeace advocates displayed a banner outside of the Ministry of the Environment in Warsaw. The banner reads "I love primeval forests" to protest against tree felling in Bialowieza Forest.
Protesters dressed as construction workers wearing hard hats and scaling the Ministry of the Environment building on harnesses.