Art and Activism in the Age of Globalization

The book seeks to uncover art that inhabits personal experience, activating the heart of society with the potential to redesign its structure.

Art and Activism in the Age of Globalization
Lieven de Cauter, Ruben de Roo and Karel Vanhaesebrouck, eds. NAi publishers, 2011 (334 pages, US $35).

Subversiveness is a mind-set in times of serious crisis but today it seems to have abandoned the field of ethical-political and aesthetic contention, with all its criticism, protest, dissidence and negation, in favour of consensus, conformism and acceptance that the world is as it is. We are consumers and live at the mercy of systems and processes that we want to be a part of and of technology that seduces us with its seemingly indispensable gadgets. Any hint of the creative and experimental spirit that used to fuel counter-cultures, subcultures and movements is neutralised by the global system's ability to absorb and digest all things. As social life and even democracy implode, it is imperative to identify new forms of commitment. We must pass from subversiveness to different, positive and constructive forms of activism. Poetic–political works by many artists can construct this option.

These are the thoughts behind a weighty book entitled Art and Activism in the Age of Globalization, in which Lieven De Cauter, Ruben De Roo and Karel Vanhaesebrouck give voice to theorists such as Rosi Braidotti, Brian Holmes and Francesca Recchia as well as artists working in various fields—from Stalker to Renzo Martens, Pippo Delbono and Tim Miller.

Art and Activism in the Age of Globalization focuses on an art-form that moves crosswise; not content to just portray it, the book seeks to uncover art that intends to shape today's world and that of the future. Art that inhabits personal experience, activating the heart of society with the potential to redesign its structure.
<i>Art and Activism in the Age of Globalization.</i>
Art and Activism in the Age of Globalization.
With totally organic results, the book alternates essays analysing theoretical assumptions on the convergence of art and activism—with a special focus on cultural activism and how the War on Terror has affected it—with the illustration of specific artistic practices and particular case histories. The sensitivities, intentions and attitudes of the artists referred to are hugely diverse and range from demanding the right to resistance to driving attitudes in order to bring changes that favour social sustainability. The results can be mimetic or explosive and the spirit humorous or playful, or aimed at creating moments of ambivalence and areas of friction. What all share is a sense of critical watchfulness and civil responsibility, an aspiration for shared intentions and creative processes, an audacity that does not shy away from disobedience and illegality and faith in desire and participation as a lever of change.

Art appears primarily in its performance dimension and as a foray into the urban area, which more specifically is a tangle of sensitivities and a dense concentrate of relationships and collective and special interests that must always be linked to the impact of global issues.
<i>Art and Activism in the Age of Globalization.</i>
Art and Activism in the Age of Globalization.
The book paints a complex picture that is a mix of crossovers, situations created by anonymous networks, signature works, scattered performances, mimetic actions, the occupation of urban spaces and experimental theatre, all and always in a close dialectic with the political and economic reality.

The contents include a Lars Kwakkenbos interview with Isa Fremeaux and John Jordan, known for their Laboratory of Insurrectionary Imagination, which instigated an act of civil disobedience by recruiting an army of rebel clowns who rode through Copenhagen on bicycles during the world climate summit. In the interview, Fremeaux and Jordan say that they have escaped from the "prisons of the art world" and are working towards a synergy between activists and artists, trying to combine the courage of the one with the other's capacity to imagine and experiment. What emerges is an "in between", a space midway between creativity and resistance, between culture and politics, a space of hope, fantasy and dreams. This is important because, according to Fremeaux and Jordan, what advances people towards a sustainable society is not awareness and numbers but the desire and ability to imagine what "might be". Militant but adventurous and theatrical, theirs are real, illegal but not dreadful acts of civil disobedience and involve pleasure, creative freedom and a focus on the aesthetics of the action. "Aesthetics are about the capacity to really feel the world, to sense it with our bodies, to be deeply aware. Which brings us to the question of paying attention, really being 'in' the world by observing it […]. Art is simply paying attention. […] It's about being in the present, a place of absolute freedom, and doing everything in the best way we can. That's the aesthetic and ethic! […] Don't separate. Especially your ethics from your aesthetics. Don't separate your everyday life from your art, don't separate making the world beautiful and changing it. We have to constantly rethink how we can resist separation."

Art is seen as spatial intervention and relational experience—grand, poetic and pragmatic theatre, the ability to catalyse energies and generate temporary experiences that will be remembered by those who find themselves caught up in them. The book goes straight to the point and comforts those reluctant to accept the idea that art is self sufficient, enjoyable objects linked to "status symbols" and immediately consumable. It shows, instead, the existence and power of an art that wants to have a direct grip on reality in terms of social and cultural change and highlights its ability to transgress, overturn the current rules and codes and appeal to those responsible for the public thing. It also confirms its constructive importance.
What these artists share is a sense of critical watchfulness and civil responsibility, an aspiration for shared intentions and creative processes, an audacity that does not shy away from disobedience and illegality and faith in desire and participation as a lever of change.

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