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Featured Story The Front Lines of Creativity: A Fellowship Forum “In our modern world the artist is tempted simply to do stunts in order to attract attention. But the true task of the artist is to discover her or his relationship to a community, a community often in desperate need of the artist’s power to see the world anew.” – Historian Page Smith, from the foreword to Art in Other Places: Artists at Work in America’s Community & Social Institutions
What’s the Message of This Medium? By Cesar Maxit “The medium is the message.” Shepard Fairey gives that famous minimalist explanation for his global campaign of street art. Today, an army of mostly young admirers puts up stickers, murals, billboards, stenciled graffiti, and wheat-pasted posters of the famous stylized face of the late wrestler/actor Andre the Giant. Almost none of the images placed in public urban areas are legal or permitted, yet thousands of people take the risk to propagate the Giant’s image and his simple message, “Obey.” Of course, they disobey laws in order to put up the Obey Giant image, and so even in its dissemination we understand that all these artsy outlaws are united in a cynically expressed message of disobeying giants. The giants to be disobeyed in our world today are governments, religions, and, more than ever, powerful international corporations, so my struggle for justice has, through the years, confronted corporate power. Originally an environmentalist, I discovered the connectedness between the global struggles for human rights and animal protection, and discovered how often the solutions sought by an affected community conflicted with the interests of a company. Whether I’m engaged in a global campaign against an imperialist war or a neighborhood movement for the right to decide what type of business may be zoned next to a place of worship, I often find a corporate representative on the other side of the courtroom, protest banner, city hall, or police barricade. The battles I’ve engaged in have always been anti-sexist, anti-racist, and anti-classist, as part of a nonviolent commitment to justice. Without the money and influence of the giants, we in the movements for justice have to use the power we do have: people, truth, love, and creativity. And creative I’ve tried to be. I've successfully used traditional street-art techniques to educate, inspire, and persuade, but there have been some innovative art installations too. As part of a neighborhood push to keep a drive-through McDonald’s from moving into our neighborhood, I channeled my anger over their legal tricks into a 30-foot-tall wooden replica of the golden arches pylon with a big red circle and line through the logo. Some neighbors helped me erect it across the street from the proposed site, to the sound of a crowd of cheering neighborhood kids.
After a few years of designing, painting, and hanging from huge banners, it occurred to me that all the banners were monotonously square-ish. So when Bush declared his crusade in Iraq, I organized a team to paint a 300-foot-long banner with the repeating declaration, “NO WAR IN IRAQ” (The “Q” doubled as a peace sign). It took dozens of spontaneous volunteers to hold the long fabric sign that was used to snake around city streets, and received much media attention around Texas. My art and I have done quite a bit of disobeying, and had more than a bit of fun. That energy, in part, is what I think has attracted corporate advertisers to the world of guerrilla/protest/street art. Today, the lines have blurred: companies spray-paint their own storefronts in mock protest, and Obey Giant appears on sweatshop shirts and bags for sale. So what’s the message of this medium?
Cesar Maxit is an Argentina-born architect living in Washington, D.C. He is a core member of the Nonviolent Youth Collective, and a trainer for Radical Encuentro Community, The Ruckus Society, and FOR’s Peacemaker Training program. Cesar’s creative skills have been employed by national nonprofits and neighborhood groups during countless demonstrations, numerous conferences, and two presidential campaigns.
Art, Community, and Resistance By Maia Williams Carpenter In the Democratic Republic of Congo, I struggled to write words to describe the destruction of peoples and land. I met too many women who had become rape survivors. One military faction is pitted against another military faction, both using women's bodies as weapons. These women continually told me that the United States is responsible for the war and that it is my duty to return to the U.S. and stop this war. I do not know exactly how I am going to fulfill my duty to these women, but I know that poetry, art, song, and dance are powerful weapons that transform people's consciousness. Art provides us new ways of perceiving and engaging the world. Creating art is my response to being transformed by the world. It is my attempt to share this transformation with others – especially with those who feel they are struggling in this world alone, and with communities destroyed by myriad forms of violence. I still cannot find the words that accurately capture the totality of my experience in the Congo, but I continue writing because I have a responsibility to the women who opened their wounds for me to understand what war is. I come from the perspective of a lover, a fighter, a queer Afro-American woman, a mystic, an artist, a leader, and a griot, praying that my art is one more bridge connecting communities of resistance. I am continually learning what war is. Speaking with the women in the Congo was like speaking to my own skin. Even though history, continents, and language separated us, we communicated – brown skin to brown skin, curly hair to curly hair, rape survivor to rape survivor. This war in the Congo is invisible to many of us in the United States. It is supported by Western governments and corporations, which have produced economic and political chaos in order to steal diamonds and minerals from the Congolese people. Art gives visibility to that which the “powers that be” would like for us to be blind to. In the Congolese churches I visited, the congregations sang, danced, and prayed the liturgy. The rape survivors, with their children wrapped in bright cloth around their backs, said that it was song and dance that healed their trauma and gave them hope. Creation is a testimony to survival. I create in the space where the personal meets the political, attempting to illuminate the spaces where our struggles form us, where we allow our struggles to lead us to freedom. I hope that this freedom will allow us to create and sustain life-giving communities.
Building a Culture of Positivity By DJ Jer I work as a deejay and radio show host: my mission as an artist is to spread a message of individuality and positivity within my audience. Since my audience consists of kids and adults, from teens to 50-year-olds, I recognize that I need to connect the generations and create conversations between those who listen to my music. This is true not only for different age groups, but also across lines of race, faith, and politics.
To me, nonviolence is the best way to deal with conflict with one another. After all, how does it make sense to attack someone who more than likely is going through what you’re going through? Instead of increasing the level of conflict, we should combine our resources and establish a better way of living for all today and for future generations. It’s very important for us – as the future leaders of this world – to step out of the box. The “box,” which I argue has been created by major corporations, becomes smaller by the day. Our box was created with the sole purpose of controlling the masses and making money out of us, from the entertainment industry trying to sell the latest movie, to the fear industry (also known as the government) trying to sell a war. The only way to step out of the box is to understand how and why it has been created. Once you understand that, and recognize where you see yourself as an individual, you’ll be able to listen to the independent voice within you – the voice that doesn’t fall victim to the traps placed by those who are trying to control and exploit us. For me, it is very important to maintain my independence, especially when I cater to an audience of disenfranchised people. With all of that in mind, I work hard to ensure that if at least one person is touched by my work, that person will know that not everything being said and done by the masses is the whole, absolute truth. I want to encourage people to explore things by themselves. It’s sad to think that millions of people are being persecuted for their beliefs just because one person may have acted in a certain way – and in a way that’s actually not condoned by the collective. It all goes back to what happens when the masses are being controlled and put in boxes. If the masses actually exercised their independent thoughts, many things that are going on in the world wouldn’t be happening right now. If I can make one person think, I will be happy knowing that I did my job. DJ Jer (a.k.a. “Sucio Smash”) is host and deejay of the “Squeeze Radio Show” on 89.9 WKCR-FM (New York City). He is also involved with artist management and as a music producer, and lives in Brooklyn.
By Hawah I don’t think I could ever use the word “your” or “mine” in describing art. I believe that all work, art, and writing is unpossessible. I am writing this with a dictionary at my side, and notice that “unpossessible” is a word that does not exist in the language “accepted” by society. But that’s fine, since neither did “Everlutionary” seven years ago.
But let me go back to the “incorrectly” spelt word. I don't believe ideas can be owned or possessed; from this perspective, art which may have my name next to it is not mine, it is simply something which my impermanent physical body has been opened to receive and transmit. Because I identify with it, I put my name next to it. That is a relationship that I share with the creation, but that does not mean I own the art. I believe that it is not possible for any human to create anything on her or his own. For me, to continue to stay independent means not to copyright my work. It is a struggle I have been facing for some years now, ever since the release of my first book, Trust Before Suspicion; thus far, I have maintained and not given into copyrighting. I feel like the absence of the © is very much my voice, even more so than what I may write in the book. Therefore, I don’t think my voice will ever be independent. My voice is interdependent. To become independent, I would need to completely void myself of all sensory perceptions, meaning, for all intents and purposes, that I would have to be dead. Maybe the only being that can be independent is someone who has died? As long as I am alive, I am at the very least dependent on water and food for survival. I wish to one day live where all militaries exist without guns, tanks, or bombs. The military shall evolve – it must – into a nonviolent peacekeeping force where soldiers carry vaccinations and not bullets. I wish to live where a police officer’s primary responsibility is to play basketball with the fatherless children in the ghetto, instead of “watching” over them with a badge and nightstick. This vision contains schools without grades or failure; humans whose potential energy is engaged and activated. The future for me is today; the prophecy of our elders who used to say: before making any decision, think about how that decision shall affect those living 11 generations from now.
The Symbiotic Relationship Between Art and Activism By Nizar Wattad Hip-hop is more than an art form or a genre of music. To many, it’s a way of life – a constantly evolving culture, created by young black Americans facing oppression, that has grown to welcome anyone whose voice has been silenced, whose identity has been marginalized. I find community in hip-hop – as a Palestinian-American raised in the U.S. South, “fitting in” was never something I did easily or well. Hip-hop embraces me as I am, and says that people like me have an important voice, an important story to tell. When I write a rhyme, I’m not thinking about the social implications. I’m not thinking about being an activist or providing my audience – mostly young Americans of all ethnic and religious backgrounds – with a history lesson. When I write a rhyme, I try to be as true to the culture of hip-hop as possible. This necessitates being true to myself, speaking from the heart, which means that, inevitably, Palestine finds its way into the music. It’s a natural process that highlights the symbiotic relationship between art and activism. I think music can be an effective means of keeping the peace and freedom movement energized. Activists can share songs with people who may not be inclined to attend a rally but definitely dig hip-hop – it can open the doors. In a more practical sense, projects like the compact disk Free the P – a compilation of hip-hop and spoken word, which is being sold to raise funds for a much-anticipated documentary film on hip-hop in Palestine – can be used to both spread the word about and financially support direct activism. In addition to telling the story of hip-hop in Palestine, the documentary (Slingshot Hip-Hop) will highlight the harsh realities of daily life under Israeli occupation. It is the firm belief of everyone involved in my kind of activism – poets and recording artists who contributed to Free the P, filmmakers like those behind Slingshot and Paradise Now – that change in the United States must be encouraged via the arts and popular culture, since that’s where most Americans today get their information. Our hope is that Slingshot will be the first documentary focusing on occupied Palestine to have a broad popular appeal, and can help push dialogue on the subject further than it has been taken. Nizar Wattad is a Palestinian-American screenwriter and hip-hop artist living in Los Angeles, California. His poetry, fiction and nonfiction writing can be accessed via The Philistines’s Web site (www.thephilistines.com).
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