Images - A space for negotiation

Art or cultural production has had an interesting history within political identity and social movements. Just recently Frances Saunders wrote inThe Independentabout the CIA and Modern Art as a “weapon” in the Cold War. Author and activist Saadia Toor, discussing the premise of her book,State of Islam: Culture and Cold War Politics in Pakistan, in an interview said, “(it) analyses key moments in the history of Pakistan through the cultural politics that defined them. The idea was to show the intimate connection between matters cultural and matters political.”

More inclusive

Occupy Wall Street (OWS), started by an alliance of artists, activists and students, offers a space for such negotiations. The movement's strength lies in its often-criticised lack of focus, which is actually conducive to being more inclusive. It provides an opportunity for various related progressive voices, some of which have been fighting the battle long before OWS, to have a chance to come together and strengthen the movement.

There has been a tendency, in recent times, for political art to be presented through a market centric context. Any piece of cultural production that confronts the failure of the establishment is often sold as a neat idea of political rebellion that's just the right amount of provocative. Making work that addresses rampant human injustice in the way Indian labourers are treated in the Gulf and then having your “political” work in the context of The Dubai Art Fair becomes self-serving, especially when done within the boundaries of the art world.

Outside of this boundary, artists, activists and social entrepreneurs work at a grassroots level, where success isn't immediate and the interest isn't fleeting. Their vision is to create sustainable and long-term change within areas ranging from environmental concerns to human rights. Creative Time, a New York based non-profit organisation recently presented, Living As Form, a project that took “a broad look at a vast array of socially engaged practices that appear with increasing regularity in fields ranging from theatre to activism, and urban planning to visual art.” The idea was to find the inter-connectedness between these disciplines that often times begs to remain undefined, beyond perhaps the fact that they are looking to creatively address and find solutions to many of the world's problems.

Various collectives

Within the NYC General Assembly (NYCGA) for OWS, which is made up of a number of groups, organised in a non-vertical, non-hierarchical structure to give direction to the movement, is the Arts and Culture group. Alongside groups that range from Alternative Banking to Community Relations, Arts and Culture comprises of various collectives including Performance Art/Theatre, Architecture and Urbanism. Action has sprung from the sentiments expressed at OWS like Occupy Museums and The Wall Street Occupennial. Occupy Museums, who recently held protests outside MoMA, addresses the relationship between art and capitalism, questioning big institutions funding structures and their ever so ambiguous relationship with the market. They also lent support to the art handlers union who has been protesting against Sotheby's over contract re-negotiations. The Wall Street Occupennial describes themselves as being “founded on the belief that artists have a crucial role to play in helping to elaborate and sustain the democratic public space...” They have created a library, organised events, archived material and makes available resources for artists to actively participate.

Of particular interest is the participation of South Asian artists and activists within OWS. In one instance a few individuals actively fought to have the language of the Declaration of the Occupation of New York City changed at one of the General Assemblies during the initial weeks of OWS, such that it didn't wipe out entire histories of oppression. This act was crucial. In order to understand how humanity needs to move forward, you need to first acknowledge its history, particularly relating to race, gender and class, in a movement that was initially seen as being dominated by the ‘White Male'. If not for this change in semantics, which could well be one example of many along these lines, the movement might have collapsed internally into the same stalemate of rhetoric that would serve no means to overcome the marginalisation of certain communities.

Creates awareness

Prachi Patankar, an activist involved with South Asia Solidarity Initiative (SASI), who organised an anti-war artistic intervention, ‘Empire on Wall Street', also expressed the same opinion. “I think doing an artistic intervention like the “Empire on Wall Street” action helps create awareness and inserts conversations about these issues and it simultaneously educates people about the connections.  It accomplishes this in a powerful and dynamic way that just a speech or teach-in may not be able to accomplish. Artistic actions like this one is also a good way for people who are not used to doing rallies and activist actions to get involved. The reception we got for this (Empire on Wall Street) action was overwhelmingly positive. People could identify their own countries in the posters that we held. Many people also came to tell us that we were missing some countries in our timeline. Our action participants also had Chase and American flag stickers on their lips to show the connection between banks and the wars. We wanted to show that there is a clear connection between Wall Street and the wars.”

Crucially all this is coming together at OWS “in real time, in real life”. What is relevant today is this folding of art and activism within a movement like OWS, into a sphere that makes it very hard to distinguish where and when an act of cultural production can be defined as one, but not the other, or both, or neither. And that its materialisation makes a definite impact or change, however small or big, within the realm of how we function and participate as individuals and communities within democracies, or in the fight towards a democracy. Anything else becomes a perpetual state of pseudo- counter culture and it's increasingly stale.