September 2005

Jen Shao's ghost bike memorial removed

Posted September 22, 2005 by in Bikes

The ghost bike we created this weekend for Jen Shao, a 65-year old grandmother killed last Friday morning by a hit-and-run bus has been removed. A few of us went on Time's Up's memorial ride in memory of Ms. Shao tonight. We rode in silence from Houston St. down to Water & Governeur, where we had installed a white bike and a memorial plaque (pictured at right) Sunday afternoon. The installation was gone --- the chain had been cut from the pole and the bike removed. The bolts that held the plaque were still there, but the wood plaque itself was gone, probably removed with a saw or a sledgehammer; either way, a shamefully violent thing to do to a memorial.

We assume that the memorial was removed by the property owners of the adjacent building. Placed in the middle of Water St., a lonely cavern of corporate office buildings, almost completely empty of people after the workday's over, I only imagine that the ghost bike was an unwelcome reminder of human life and death --- an intrusion on the cold order of a block dedicated to money, not people. Compare this to what happened with Andrew Morgan's ghost bike after it was damaged by a cab: the bike was taken in by a nearby bar and kept there until it could be re-installed. That's the difference between a neighborhood where people live, socialize and give themselves space to relax, think, and care about their neighbors and human life in general, and a neighborhood where massive property owners obsessed only with order and cleanliness and a constituency of employees with no input or real interaction with the street life that surrounds them. To people like Bloomberg and Bruce Smolka, the latter is a vision of utopia. To me, it's the end of any kind of meaningful city, or citizenship.

We will replace Jen Shao's ghost bike. The memorials are a struggle against forgetting.

Reminder: Reproduce & Revolt call

Posted September 22, 2005 by in Artwork Needed

A quick reminder to all you artists out there about the Reproduce & Revolt project: Josh MacPhee is now working with Favianna Rodriguez as co-editor of what promises to be an extremely ambitious and exciting book:

Reproduce and Revolt! is a graphic toolbox to be launched into the hands of political activists all over the world. The book will contain over 300 new and exciting high-quality black & white illustrations and graphics about social justice and political activism for activists to use on flyers, posters, t-shirts, brochures, stencils or any other graphic aspects of political campaigns. All the graphics will be bold and easy to reproduce, in addition to being royalty-free/open source/anti-copyright/creative commons. This means folks will be able to use and reproduce the graphics for free! The book will come with clear instructions on how to best utilize the images so as to improve the graphic qualities of political campaigns. It will also contain a short history of political graphics, an archive of political flyers and posters throughout history, as well as information about and a bibliography of further reading for all of the social justice issues the art will cover.

The deadline is approaching quickly (October 31), so if you have work that meets the criteria, send it in soon. The full call for artwork, with complete details, specs, and contact information is below the fold:

CALL FOR ARTWORK

to be published in a new book.

Deadline: October 31st, 2005

Reproduce and Revolt!: Radical Graphics for the 21st Century

Edited by Josh MacPhee & Favianna Rodriguez

Soft Skull Press

Reproduce and Revolt! is a graphic toolbox to be launched into the hands of political activists all over the world. The book will contain over 300 new and exciting high-quality black & white illustrations and graphics about social justice and political activism for activists to use on flyers, posters, t-shirts, brochures, stencils or any other graphic aspects of political campaigns. All the graphics will be bold and easy to reproduce, in addition to being royalty-free/open source/anti-copyright/creative commons. This means folks will be able to use and reproduce the graphics for free! The book will come with clear instructions on how to best utilize the images so as to improve the graphic qualities of political campaigns. It will also contain a short history of political graphics, an archive of political flyers and posters throughout history, as well as information about and a bibliography of further reading for all of the social justice issues the art will cover.

We are now collecting submissions of graphics, illustrations and art for the book, which will be published by Soft Skull Press in late 2006. We will chose for the book according quality of the image, reproducibility, and how well the graphic conveys the issues. Not everyone's submissions will be included. We will also be attempting to craft the book to represent the output of as diverse a group of artists as possible, across gender, race, ethnicity, nationality, sexuality, ability, etc. Reproduce & Revolt! is not intended to be a who's who of well known and successful political artists, this call is open to ALL levels of artists.

This is Josh MacPhee's second book with Soft Skull Press. His first, Stencil Pirates: A Global Survey of Street Stenciling, was released in July 2004. Stencil Pirates has gotten great reviews and is currently in it's third printing. Favianna Rodriguez is a Chicana designer and political artist based in the Bay Area who will be co-editing the book.

Here are the specifications for the images:

--- BLACK & WHITE/Greyscale.

--- High Resolution: either original artwork on paper or high res digital images, minimum 600 dpi for greyscale, 1200 dpi for line art.

--- vector-based graphics in .ai and .eps file types are encouraged (but in no way mandatory!)

--- A minimum of 6 inches x 6 inches.

--- All mediums are accepted (various forms of printmaking, drawing, digital design, collages, etc.). The main factor is reproducibility.

--- Because I hope the book will be useful for years to come, no graphics that are specific to individual politicians or limited specific political campaigns will be selected. This means NO George Bush graphics. The goal of the book is not to be a "best of" of anti-war or anti-bush images, but a collection of political graphic material that will continue to be directly useful to political activists for years to come.

Below are the catagories of issues the images should address (there will inevitably be overlap between the categories, these are simply guidelines and suggestions to help clarify and spark inspiration). In addition, the book will contain graphics in support of positive activities as well as graphics in opposition to negative aspects of the world, these are both included below (in alphabetical order, not order of importance!):

--- Anti-Authoritarianism (including anarchism, hierarchy, direct action, mutual aid and more)

--- Anti-Racism & Third World/POC Unity (institutional racism, racial equality, unity among peoples of color throughout the world, national movements, attacks on youth of color, white privilege and more)

--- Arts & Culture as Tools of Resistance (including images that represent practices of music, art, graffiti, breakdance, hip hop, punk, singing, djing, capoeira, as forms of resistance)

--- Counter-Globalization (including corporate control, IMF, World Bank, WTO, capitalism, austerity, world debt, alternative economies and more)

--- Education (including privatization, self-education, free schools, liberatory pedagogy, urban inequalities, military recruitment and more)

--- Environment (including environmental justice, environmental racism, endangered species, animal rights, earth liberation, deforestation, strip mining, water rights, bio-tech, organics, community gardens and more)

--- Feminism (including women's struggles, wages for housework, equal pay for equal work, equal rights, gender discrimination, women's liberation movement, sexual assault, men against sexism, fat lib. and more)

--- Food (including food justice, anti-fast-food, meat industry, right to whole foods, people's farms, vegeterianism/veganism, GMO's)

--- Government & Police Brutality (including bureaucracy, taxes, anti-cop, police brutality, elections, voter fraud, voter disenfranchisement, voting rights, and more)

--- Health Care (including disability, mental health, AIDS, access, abortion, aging and more)

--- Housing (including public housing, gentrification, private ownership, abandonment, homelessness and more)

--- International Solidarity (including connections with movements around the world, borders, mutual aid, national liberation, Zapatista support, Cuba support, Palestine Support, indigenous solidarity and more)

--- Immigration & Border Issues (including US/Mexico border wall, refugees, deportation, detention, English-only laws, immigrant rights, immigrant-bashing, denouncing term "illegal")

--- Land Struggles (including Palestine, Native land theft, right to nationhood and land, anti-privatization land laws)

--- Labor (including unions, work slowdowns/stoppages/sabotage, strikes, bosses, anti-work, economics, campesinos, farm workers, maquiladoras, sweatshops, sex work and more)

--- Media (including media control, media justice, media consolidation, independent media, pirate radio and more)

--- Prisons (including prison reform, prison abolition, racism in the criminal justice system, the death penalty, political prisoners, stopping the construction of prisons, torture, sentencing discrepancies and more)

--- Protest (including marches, protests, direct action, pickets, plowshares, armed actions and more)

--- Queer Liberation (including gay, lesbian, trans, intersex, and bisexual struggle, gender binaries, queer bashing, sexual liberation and more)

--- War (including anti-war, imperialism, militarism, state terrorism, war tax resistance, nuclear weapons, "collateral damage" and more)

--- Youth Power (including youth organizing, youth voices, children's rights)

We will craft about a dozen chapters out of these catagories, and each chapters will be filled with 30-40 new and exciting illustrations and graphics created by dozens of political artists, hopefully including you. A website of high resolution copies of a large number of the images in the book will also be created, and ideally I will include some of the graphics that don't make the cut into the published volume. People will be able to both photocopy the images or pull them directly into digital files via the website.

We hope this project will help activists and organizers all over the world, but also help boost radical artists themselves by getting our work further out into the world. We hope to be able to pay a nominal fee for each piece published as well as give each artist access to books at 50% off the cover price.

All material must be submitted by October 31st, 2005.

THIS IS THE FINAL DEADLINE

There is no limit to the number of images you can submit.

Remember BLACK & WHITE, NO COLOR please

All images need to be emailed to "reproduce [at] justseeds [dot] org" OR "favianna [at] favianna [dot] com"

or mailed to:

Josh MacPhee/R&R

53 Third St.

Troy, NY 12180

If you have any additional questions, feel free to write or email the above addresses.

Thanks,

Josh MacPhee & Favianna Rodriguez

www.justseeds.org

www.stencilpirates.org

www.favianna.com

www.tumis.com

Crimethinc re-releases DIY guides

Posted September 21, 2005 by in Books & Zines

Crimethinc, those dreamy utopian anarcho-poets, have reprinted two excellent zines full of tips and information on graffiti and a whole lot more:

The Walls Are Alive: A concise and masterfully conceived introduction to doing your own graffiti. It consists of practical and thorough advice on every step of getting your graffiti skills primed: preparation, how to make a stencil, mapping it out, strategy, escape, post-action regrouping, and also a whole section about wheat-pasting. Valuable also for its forty photographs of great real-world graffiti to ignite ideas and provide examples.

DIY Guide #2: This rugged little urban pirate handbook includes practical information and tips on tons of different projects, tasks and adventures: dismantling capitalism, forearm guards, software piracy, diy spelling and grammar, travelling on trains, backpacking, evasion communiqué #2.25, herbal gynecology, how to abort, sewing, diy oil change, quarter pipe, records, cd's and zines, book publishing contacts, postal jubilation, cook it yourself, wheat flour egg noodles, intro to plaster, black and white photography, safety pin tattoos.

The graffiti zine is especially good, and has inspired innumerable young punks to cook up their first bucket of wheatpaste. The Crimethinc kids do an admirable job of distributing huge numbers of free zines & posters. You can help them out by ordering a bundle and getting the word out.

Ghost Bike for Jen Shao

Posted September 19, 2005 by in VR Projects

On Sunday, September 18, members of Visual Resistance created and installed a ghost bike memorial for Jen Shao, a 65-year old grandmother killed by a hit-and-run driver in the financial district last Friday morning. Ms. Shao was struck by a charter bus while attempting to turn from Governeur Lane onto Water St., a busy two-way street with no bike lane. The driver never stopped; police are classifying this as a hit-and-run, a potential felony.

Creating and installing ghost bikes is a sad and moving process. The death of a fellow bicyclist hits home, since we travel the same unsafe streets and face the same risks; it could just as easily be one of us. At Governeur and Water St. on Sunday afternoon, a collection of flowers and candles was laid out along with photographs and notes from neighbors and friends. We locked a bike painted white and bolted a small memorial plaque to a signpost as the cars continued to speed by. A biker and several pedestrians stopped and stood with us for a few moments.

The installation is intended as a reminder of the tragedy that took place on Friday, September 16th at this lonely corner in the financial district, and as a quiet statement in support of bikers' right to safe travel. Previous memorials have been installed for Elizabeth Padilla, Andrew Ross Morgan, and Brandie Bailey. Our hearts go out to their friends and families.

Each time we say we hope to never have to do it again --- but we remain comitted to making these memorials as long as they are needed.

See all the ghost bikes.

Action!

Posted September 16, 2005 by in VR Projects

In the last few days we've posted two series of photos of street artists at work in our photolog. The first is of two folks working together to wheatpaste in a hard to reach spot, and the second is of a series of wooden animals being bolted to streetsigns in Flatbush. They're fun photos, so check 'em out, and be sure to keep checking the photolog as well as our flickr page --- they're updated pretty regularly.

Artists' cooperatives

Posted September 15, 2005 by in In the News

Designer and all-around good guy John Emerson has an article in the latest issue of Communication Arts about designers who use collective or cooperative structures to collaborate and make a living. He describes the history and practices of co-ops in general, and describes the various ways that graphic designers and artists can benefit from structuring their decision-making, production, and proceeds cooperatively. So, why form a cooperative?

One argument is that organizations owned by the communities they serve are more accountable, and can emphasize service over profit. When employees govern their own workplace, they can design a happier, stable and more equitable work environment.

But there’s also the value of organizing according to one’s ideals. Though we are supposedly living in a democracy, most of us spend our days working for private tyrannies. Living and participating in a democracy should consist of more than just voting once a year. We should be able to participate in the decisions that affect our lives.

The examples for working artists' cooperatives are an inspiration --- and a challenge --- to those of use trying to work collectively. He profiles the Design Action Collective, Eggplant Active Media Workers’ Collective, the Red Sun Press printshop, the Tech Underground, and Brooklyn's own the 62. The groups structures vary, from Limited Liability Corporations, to non-profit union shops, to informal (unincorporated) alliances of friends.

John describes the power of structured, collective work in his profile of the Design Action Collective:

Their clients sing praise of their work and its impact. “If it’s not documented, it didn’t happen,” says Iris Carter Brown from the Louisiana Bucket Brigade. Holding up a report produced by Design Action about the campaign to stop Shell from polluting her neighborhood, she says, “Here’s the proof, this is real. We are not crazy, and we are tired of putting up with this.” The polished, sophisticated graphics project an image of an organized, sophisticated movement --- one that can overcome its opponents.

...and gets into the kind of working relationship cooperative structures can foster in his profile of the 62:

The studio is incorporated as a partnership and uses consensus to operate. “If everybody is not on board, we choose another project,” says Matthew. [...]. “As a collective, we like seeding alternative ideas. We take turns working on projects,” he says. “It’s like a group of musicians. We’ve found a comfortable working space to jam.”

Read the whole article here, and be sure to follow the links to the profiled organizations: they include some of the best political design groups out there.

Images by Josh MacPhee, from the Street Art Workers 2003 project: Utopia/Dystopia.

Corporate vandals not welcome

Posted September 14, 2005 by in Culture Jamming / Ads & Adbusting

Following up on previous entries about corporate incursions into the street art world, there's a new sticker campaign we've been noticing around downtown NYC. The stickers, reading "corporate vandals not welcome" are usually stuck over advertising stickers for a small circle of companies that are use the "hip" cachet of street art to try to brand their products as edgy or underground.

These companies --- and more importantly the ad agencies that design their marketing campaigns --- are parasitic and useless. They ride the wave of energy produced by thousands of artists working anonymously for no or little gain, and they drain that energy by cannibalizing its forms to sell products and values that have nothing to do with the movement they're ripping off. And, what's worse, the unchallenged co-existence of art & commerce in the street art movement cultivates and reinforces the worst tendencies amongst artists: self-promotion, slick & heartless design, a complete lack of content, easy outs & cookie-cutter derivatives, smug hipness.

Lots of folks are talking these days and no one's saying all that much. Thumbs up to whoever's putting these stickers up, just for calling bullshit. If you know who's behind these, drop us a line at visual.resistance[at]gmail.com. Thanks.

Update: Momo writes in to alert us to something so wrong-headed and stupid it just makes my head spin. Ekosystem has a link to a new music video that uses clips of skateboarding street artists putting up stickers, all to the sounds of that pinnacle of streetwise urban rebellion: Bon Jovi. You know what? If you had told me a year ago that the words "Bon Jovi" would appear on this website, I would have burned my computer, moved to the mountains, and learned Esperanto.

Anyway: check out the Ekosystem board for link to the mind-boggling wrongness, and to join the ongoing discussion on street art & ads.

Overspray show at Orchard Street Gallery

Posted September 14, 2005 by in Events

The good folks who put out Overspray Magazine, the stencil/street art glossy that celebrates its first anniversary this month, are setting up a show at Skewville's Orchard Street Gallery and it sounds like a biggie:

Overspray Magazine Presents

PICK UP THE PIECES

New York, NY, September 2005 --- Overspray Magazine, the world’s first and only magazine dedicated 100% to street art, have assembled a blowout exhibition of over 150 works by established and up and coming street artists to be held at The Orchard Street Gallery, 139 Orchard street between Delancey and Rivington. The exhibition will be on view from September 22-26, with an opening party on Thursday, September 22 at 7:30PM. The opening party will feature sounds by DJ Nature from Puerto Rico, free copies of brand new Overspray Issue #4, and, because they love you, free drinks.

PICK UP THE PIECES will feature works by Pisa73 and Evol from CT’INK in Berlin, Hammo, Sixten, Dr3w, Fremantle, New York’s ELC, Michael Defeo, Parskid, Tyler Kline, Peat Wollaeger, Asbestos and Creeper among others. The art will be priced as low as possible -- between $25 and $200 – and will be sold right off the wall.

Full listing in the extended entry:

PICK UP THE PIECES will also mark the completion of Overspray Issue #4, and the magazines one year anniversary. The sumptuous glossy magazine will include artist interviews with a focus on art that translates into fashion. Get a peek at clothing lines by NYC’s own Claw, I love you, Robots will Kill, and Germany’s Superflu Societe and Momo Collective. Overspray Issue #4

also includes an international group of stencil artists who submitted hand-stenciled clothing for one of the hottest photo shoots of summer on NYC’s Frying Pan boat. Also get to know the magic and splendor of Skewville and TOWER.

Besides marking the premiere of Issue #4, PICK UP THE PIECES will launch the new Overspray website, which will be the most comprehensive, informative and interactive street art website on the web. The new site will have galleries where artists can upload their work and have it critiqued by peers, interactive forums with free membership, event listings as well as reviews

of past events and videos and audio clips from interviews.

Overspray is the world’s first and only 100% street art magazine. The quarterly magazine is an entirely independent, artist run publication, with international contributors and distribution. Overspray features artists working on the street and in public spaces as well as on other mediums including clothing, which is the theme for Overspray Issue #4.

Wobbly centennial celebration at CUNY

Posted September 12, 2005 by in Events

From Nicole Schulman, co-editor of Wobblies! the wonderful comic history of the Industrial Workers of the World:

100th Anniversary of the Wollblies: A New York City Celebration of the IWW Centenary

Tuesday, September 13, 6:30pm

CUNY Graduate Center - 365 5th Avenue (at 34th St), NYC

Free admission

The hundredth anniversary of the Industrial Workers of the World will be celebrated by artists, historians, musicians and today's Wobbly organizers. The event will feature performances, talks and a slide show commemorating the Wobblies role in Labor history. Featuring:

--- DANIEL GROSS (Starbucks Workers Union, IWW)

--- PAUL BUHLE (historian; Senior Lecturer, Browne University; co-editor of 'Wobblies! A Graphic History')

--- HENRY FONER (Labor activist, musician, historian)

--- JOHN PIETARO (protest musician, Labor organizer, writer)

--- PETER KUPER (artist)

--- NICOLE SCHULMAN (artist, co-editor of 'Wobblies! A Graphic History')

--- SABRINA JONES (artist)

--- SETH TOBOCMAN (artist)

This event will also be the official release party of the new CD 'I DREAMED I HEARD JOE HILL LAST NIGHT...A CENTURY OF IWW SONG' by John Pietaro & The Flames of Discontent

Plus, an exhibit of original art from the "Wobblies!" book will be up in the exhibition hall (near the student center, ground floor) at CUNY grad center from Sept. 1 through Sept. 23rd.

Benefit poster for Katrina victims

Posted September 12, 2005 by in Posters

From the Northland Poster Collective:

In the wake of Hurricane Katrina we have produced a poster (by Northland artist Ricardo Levins Morales) that seeks to capture the sadness and the anger that this moment calls forth. the poster will benefit relief efforts by way of the Southern Partners Fund. Based in Atlanta, the fund has relationships with grassroots groups throughout the region and is governed democratically. They are able to respond to needs as they arise in the full range of affected communities. Please take a look at this image and pass along word of it to others who may appreciate it.

Nothland is a great resource for posters and other political art, see Ricardo Levins Morales' Katrina memorial poster here. Remember too that you can contribute directly to grassroots organizations doing on-the-ground work with hurricane victimes here.

Comics vs. prisons

Posted September 11, 2005 by in Events

Several artists who contributed to the Wobblies book are hosting a slide show/discussion/book party for the Real Cost of Prisons Project:

The creators of three comic books about the effects of mass incarceration will show slides and discuss their work, along with activists who are using the comics to educate and organize for less reliance on prisons and more just policies and practices.

After 30 years of the "War on Drugs" and tough-on-crime laws, America's prison population has skyrocketed to the highest in the world. Lois Ahrens, director of the Real Cost of Prisons Project, collaborated with Sabrina Jones, Kevin Pyle and Susan Willmarth to create three 20-page comic books,"Prisoners of the War on Drugs," "Prison Town: Paying the Price," and "Prisoners of a Hard Life: Women and Their Children," which are distributed to activists and educators. Requests pour in, hand-written from inside prisons, or emailed from lobbyists and family support groups.

LOIS AHRENS will discuss her choice of comics as an organizing tool. Artists SABINA JONES and KEVIN PYLE will project images and read from the comics. CHRISTINA VOIGHT will speak from her perspective as someone who has survived being incarcerated and is now doing her doctoral work on the related issues of women and children of incarceration.

@ Museum of Comic and Cartoon Art

594 Broadway, Suite 401, NYC

Between Houston and Prince St.

Monday, September 19, 2005, 6:30pm

Free Admission

Benefit for Katrina Victims TONIGHT!

Posted September 10, 2005 by in Events

A night of political spoken word, folk, & hip hop to raise money for the Katrina victims. Show your love and support!

Saturday September 10th, 2005, 7:00 pm - ???

STAY GOLD GALLERY, 451 Grand St, Williamsburg,

$5-$20 sliding scale all proceeds will be donated to AmeriCares

Performances by:

Alixa & Naima (Climbing poeTree), Bonfire Madigan, Cameron Hull, Dynasty Handbag, Honeychild, Maija Garcia, Tippy, TK Webb & Shannon, & More

Musicians bring instruments if you want to jam or perform.

Bring your $ and they'll provide the beer and the booze til it is gone.

Ghost Cycles in Seattle

Posted September 8, 2005 by in Inspirations

Upon returning home to Seattle, our friend came across two ghost bicycles on her ride home from the airport. It turns out there is an amazing group called GhostCycle.org which has been collecting data on car-related bicycle accidents in Seattle since May 26, 2005. Cyclists all across Seattle submitted info on 103 incidents where a moving vehicle had struck them. On August 1, 2005 they installed 40 ghost cycles with plaques reading "CYCLIST STRUCK HERE" where the most numerous and most severe accidents have taken place.

The most powerful aspect of the project is the testimonials from cyclists who survived their accidents. Perhaps sharing the details of these experiences will help identify areas that need to be improved so that the roads will be safer for everyone.

A map on the site shows the locations of the 40 ghost cycles as well as photos of each installation. The site features statistics based on information sent to the site such as percentages of bikers who reported their accidents to the authorities, were obeying traffic laws at the time of the accident, were wearing helmets and using lights when they were struck, and accidents that were hit and runs. The links are also extensive and include bicycle advocacy groups, lawyers, clubs, and memorials to other fallen cyclists. This group is truly an inspiration.

Related: VR's own Ghost Bike Project.

Media "Blackout" in New Orleans

Posted September 7, 2005 by in Political Art

With the recent destruction of New Orleans, and the lawless aftermath there now exists an exetremely volatile circumstance. While the mayor declares a final evacuation to "forcibly remove" those that remain, the city of New Orleans will finally be a militarized zone. Reporters covering instances of "looting" or shootouts will continue to have their images and equipment confiscated and be physically threatened (Reporters Without Borders). The portrayal of people in most need will be demonized and marginalized as criminals, further encouraging racist stereotypes. The death and destruction are also images that the administration doesn't want the general public to see. Much like the returning corpses and caskets of occupied Iraq, the media was requested, by FEMA, not to run images of dead bodies, because "the recovery of the victims is being treated with dignity and the utmost respect." In my opinion FEMA is more interested in covering up the destruction which they are required to prevent and respond to.

There also will be an amazing opportunity for slimy politicians and businesses to make a buck, as Democracy Now! reports today,

"...former head of FEMA, Joe Allbaugh, may stand to profit from the catastrophe in the Gulf region through his various lobbying efforts."

He headed FEMA until March 2003 just as the U.S. was launching its invasion of Iraq. Then Allbaugh helped form a lobbying firm called New Bridge Strategies in order to help clients "take advantage of business opportunities in the Middle East following the conclusion of the U.S.-led war in Iraq." New Bridge Strategies was also formed by several top executives from the lobbying firm then known as Barbour Griffith & Rogers. The head of that firm was Haley Barbour who is now the Republican governor of Mississippi. Earlier this year Joe Allbaugh signed on as a lobbyist for Halliburton subsidiary KBR in order to "educate the congressional and executive branch on defense, disaster relief and homeland security issues." Just last week the federal government announced that Halliburton would be hired to repair the Gulf Coast military bases damaged by Katrina. And now the Washington Post is reporting that Allbaugh is also helping Louisiana "coordinate the private-sector response to the storm."

It appears very convenient to remove the citizens of a locale, especially "dangerous" people of color, so that Multi-National businesses like Halliburton may have an easier time revitalizing a city that has been totally demolished.

I find the connections and possible financial gain by the same manipulative politicains and businessmen who brought us the Iraq war, apalling and disgusting. And I wish to encourage all journalists and photographers to document every aspect of the military occupation of New Orleans, as well as the carnage and death that is becoming more apparent every day. There are many outlets for this reporting and it is exetremely necessary for civil society to know how this disaster is being handled. For those that don't have access to news media and are documenting these events, some suggestions are posting imagery and reporting on Indymedia, or even publishing photos on Fickr. Media activists in Houston are setting up a microradio station right now! There are so many forms of Independent media and they need to be utilized. If you have other suggestions please post them in the comments.

Darius & Downey's "We're on it" opening today!

Posted September 7, 2005 by in Events

NYC based artists Darius and Downey have their debut gallery opening, today at the Jen Bekman Gallery, 6 Spring St, from 6-8pm.

Darius & Downey create street installations parodying street signs, somtimes as "fine art," while other times using well known traffic symbols that are often overlooked.

We're on It uses humor to underscore institutional regulation of public behavior and to provoke awareness of how this control affects the evaluation of art, self, and social status. Subtle, comic and often provocative, Darius + Downey surprise their viewers with their reactions to how property, space and personal experience overlap in an era of privatization. Using found and forgotten remnants of urban architecture, Darius + Downey reinvent public objects and reinsert them into the every-day landscape. Street signs, cement bricks and public telephones in unexpected places are manipulated to create personal relationships with each other and with passersby. These temporary disruptions � persisting as little as minutes and as long as months � toy with interrelations between individuals as they inhabit public and private space.

I really appreciate and enjoy how beautiful and provocative their work can be, and get excited every time I discover a new peice on the street. Some of the VR collective have expressed sadness when their neighborhood Darius & Downey pieces were destroyed. So not only engage the viewer to question their surroundings, they become a welcome part of the visual landscape.

Congratulations to the both of them, they are hard working fellas and have totally earned this opportunity! The show will be up from September 7th to October 22nd, for those that can make it at a later date.

The end of "graffiti news" in Gaza

Posted September 2, 2005 by in Street Art / Graffiti

The Israeli pullout from Gaza has mostly been shown in the American media through dramatic images of Israelis being evacuated from the settlements. As usual there is much less media focus on the Palestinians and the changes the Gaza pullout is bringing about in their society. According to the Middle East Times, one of the first actions of the Palestinian Authority after the pullout has been a graffiti clean-up:

It is impossible to come to Gaza and not notice the drawings and murals that fill the walls along the streets of the Strip. Ever since the outbreak of the first intifada in 1987, graffiti has served as a sort of diary open to all. But no longer.

Following the Israeli withdrawal from Gaza, the Palestinian Authority (PA) has launched a campaign to clean and beautify the walls and streets of Gaza City.

At first glance this would seem a strange priority for the Palestinian Authority, but the fact that it is a priority speaks volumes about the power of graffiti and the contradictary nature of propaganda. It also gives a stark example of how the control of public space and public discourse is in fact a fight for political hegemony.

Check out the shifting understanding of the utilitarian value of graffiti. During the spontaneous and mostly non-violent first intifada:

During the late 1980s when the Gaza Strip was under Israeli military occupation, Israel banned any Palestinian publications not following military censorship rules. Speaking about the occupation, mentioning Palestine or even drawing the national flag were serious crimes that were harshly punishable.

As a result Palestinian militant groups resorted to the only means available to them to inform Palestinians of their operations and to express their opinions freely: graffiti.

Soon, the walls of the Gaza Strip became the Palestinians' national newspaper, reporting news about the Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO) abroad, attacks on Israeli soldiers or the date of the next demonstration or strike. The graffiti-ridden walls also served as an obituary and a congratulations page all at once.

But, now that the PA is in charge:

Officials at Gaza Municipality, which is spearheading the cleaning campaign, say that the era of "wall newspapers" has ended with the end of the Israeli occupation.

"We are not under Israeli military administration anymore, so there is no need to ruin Gaza's special aesthetic with graffiti," Majdi Abu Shaaban of Gaza Municipality's public relations department said.

"We have our own newspapers, radios and TV stations to announce everything, so continued graffiti spraying on walls would be considered vandalism," he added.

Writing on walls was considered a subversive activity if it was critical of the PA, and for several years after the PA took root in Gaza in 1994, Palestinians believed that the messages were appropriate as long as their content attacked the Israeli occupation, but they shunned the use of graffiti as a means to criticize their own government.

This is revealing of the particular tension that happens when a movement against those in charge finally takes charge. Political expression is reined in as the nationalism fueled by hatred for the old oppressor is channeled into patriotism and faith in the new rulers. It reminds me of the ways in which early Soviet poster designs, intially bursting with revolutionary egalitarian energy, was twisted into cult-of-personality authoritarianism under Stalin (the best book on this is Building the Collective, sadly out of print).

As a sidenote, the article also makes clear that no matter where you go, politicians all basically think alike:

As a clear sign of the importance of this campaign, Palestinian Prime Minister Ahmed Qurei showed up on the first day wearing a white T-shirt and a white baseball cap, and then took a paint roller and started erasing a slogan scribbled by his Fatah movement.

...as do home owners:

"Of course, I understand the value of graffiti and the posters of fallen Palestinians to our people," he says. "But I don't understand why they have to ruin my wall."

Photo at top from Reuters, via Middle East Times.

Pure Horror

Posted September 1, 2005 by in Political Art

The scenes from New Orleans are heartbreaking and bring back horrible memories of New York on September 11. But where that tragedy was an instant shock, the full toll from Hurricane Katrina is only slowly sinking in, and the situation in the affected area only seems to be getting worse every day. Our hearts go out to everyone affected. Relief is badly needed --- not least because the government seems to be absolutely unprepared --- anyone with the means, if you haven't done so already, please donate to the Red Cross, the American Friends Service Committee, or America's Second Harvest, and anyone in the Southeast or Gulf Coast can open their doors to refugees through HurricaneHousing.org. Please recommend further ways to help in the comments, or drop us a line at visual.resistance[at]gmail.com

UPDATE: Here's a list of grassroots organizations doing Katrina relief.