Acts of Resistance: Activists, Interlopers and Pranksters: The Change of War

Tuesday, February 7, 2017

The Change of War

The Manga and War exhibition at NJCU holds the kind of art that makes you think and reflect on the history of humanity, and it's future. Manga and War showcase manga ( Japanese comics) illustrated and written about stories of WWII. The piece I focused on was Fumiyo Kono's "In This Corner of The World" telling the story of a young woman who survived the bombings and the inner turmoil she faces in a changed world.

Fumiyo Kono was born on September 28, 1968 in Hiroshima and started to draw manga when she was a junior high school student. Kono studied at Hiroshima University and moved to Tokyo later on. Her influences include Osamu Tezuka, and Fujiko Fujio, other famous manga artists.
In This Corner of the World illustrates and shows how one's whole world can change in the blink of an eye. The main character Suzu lived an innocent and peaceful life before the bomb raids and even after the war was over, she had to live through and overcome the horrifying aftermath. It relates to the class discussions because the world is rapidly changing and it can change a person so much. In John Berger's ways of seeing, this quote "To remain Innocent may also be, to remain ignorant" ( Berger).Innocence is a very valued asset to a person but it blinds us into thinking there are no struggles or hardships in the world.

In This Corner of The World, Fumiyo Kono, 2007-2009

Another work that speaks of war, and humanity is Francisco Goya's "Third of May 1808." It shows of a man, dressed in white, arms up in surrender, surrounded by troops in black ready to kill him. The history of the painting is to show the rebellion against Napoleon's armies. Like In This Corner of the World, Third of May 1808 is about war and struggle. This painting was also featured in John Berger's Ways of Seeing documentary. War is a very terrible thing, that destroys so many lives, whether it be a life or an outlook on life. Right now, like the man in white, we are fighting for our rights as human beings in a very critical time in American History, and like Suzu, we are trying to come to terms on how to live in this new world so different from before. We either live through it, or rebel it.

Third of May 1808, Francisco Goya, 1814

Works Cited

Ways of Seeing By John Berger quotes
https://www.goodreads.com/work/quotes/2507145-ways-of-seeing

Third of May by Francisco Goya
https://www.khanacademy.org/humanities/becoming-modern/romanticism/romanticism-in-spain/a/goya-third-of-may-1808

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Due 5/3

FINAL SEMESTER PROJECT

Mapping Social/Cultural Hot Topics and Interventions: Art, Movements and Civic Action

The goal of this assignment is to get you to take a stand on a significant issue related to the course material and then to highlight and support a past or current act of resistance. In order to be a conscientious participant in community and society, one must attend the current events and important social/political struggles of current times. Race relations, gender equality, social justice, health care, reproductive rights, privacy, corporate regulation, marriage equality, religious tolerance, LGBT rights, etc. are all examples of issues citizens have engaged in acts of opposition and resistance, using any number of creative strategies.

From the database of current events and social issues that we have been discussing during the course, choose an issue, artist, movement or citizen action that exemplifies an act of resistance as we have outlined throughout the semester. Using one (or more) of the readings and resources we have used as a way to make a critical argument, create a writing project that encourages or supports the artist or movement and presents their work to a larger audience. Make a case for why this act of resistance is important, timely and worth engaging in and promoting. Be sure to research extensively and thoughtfully in choosing and supporting your artist or movement. Be sure that your project coincides with your own political motivations, ideas and your professional ambitions.

Consider and research extensively and thoughtfully the history and development of the issue you have chosen. The themes and topics of the course have had a recurring history of friction within America’s culture and institutions.You will need to describe and explain the strategies that have been used and are now being used to engage this issue currently and explain how the example you have chosen to highlight fits into the larger issue. The writing project can take the form of an online article, an essay, a blog, a website, tumblr, or even a podcast. Students can present ideas outside of this list if they would like to propose other ways of presenting their writing for this assignment. All students will propose their final projects at midterm and must have their project topic approved by the professor.

In addition to the writing project, each student will do an oral presentation, with visual support materials that summarizes your project. Be prepared to facilitate a discussion with your peers by preparing questions that will be topics of discussion.

INSTRUCTIONS: Be prepared to present your projects to the class in approximately 7 minute presentations. Visuals are a must. Feel free to bring physical props and handouts if appropriate. Remember you are ”pitching” the project to the class. Prepare a succinct and exciting summary of the project that is clear and makes the class want to look further at your project and potentially share the project, promote it and even get involved!

You must create a POST for your final project on the class blog. These must be completed and posted before class on 5/3 before 9:00am. This is a portion of your final grade. The post must include a link to your project, a clear and well written summary, images and/or videos. You will present from your post. Your project must live in the world (online or not) but all components of your project and presentation must link from the blog post somehow. Your resource list/bibliography must be included in your post or handed in to the professor.

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Checklist for posting your project to class blog:

-clear and well written summary of your project on the class blog along with images and any videos

-link to your project which lives elsewhere in the world must be clearly included in your post

-presentations (7 minutes) will be from your blog post and must be linked directly from the post PLEASE CHECK YOUR POST and be sure LINKS and images are working BEFORE ARRIVING IN CLASS.

-research must be included in the blog post as resource list/bibliography

________________

Due 4/26

NO New Readings

TK20 in class and presentation of projects in progress

Good luck! Count down to final presentations...

_________________

Due 4/19

NO New Readings

review Chapter 3 Ready to Wear pgs 97-108

Edit Post 3 until 4/17 10am

Place an update of your project in progress on the blog

we will be presenting our projects in class and getting critique from each other on our work in progress

3 comments on student project proposals (if you have not already) - give constructive feedback, thoughtful critique and suggest resources to 3 students on their project proposals.

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Due 4/12

READING: Chapter 3 Ready to Wear pgs 97-108 Interventionists

POST 3 (Due 4/12)

WRITTEN COMMUNICATION

Activism through Art Writing Assignment

Post the following writing assignment to the class blog:

Using the Interventionists text book as a resource choose a social or political issue often addressed by artists and activists. Then choose 3-5 projects that intersect/address/critique this theme. Present the ideas of this issue and the various projects that in different ways address the issue. You may use artists covered in the text or feel free to use artists that you may find in your own research. How do the artists address the issue? What medium/media do they use? How do they engage an audience? Why are these challenges to these issues important? How is activism in art different from political activism outside of the art world? Is it?

~800 words, at least 3 artist examples, 3 images and 3 links (portfolio sites, gallery exhibitions, videos etc)

3 comments on student project proposals - give constructive feedback, thoughtful critique and suggest resources to 3 students on their project proposals.

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Due 4/5

NO NEW READINGS - work on your semester project!!

Post a short description of your semester project (in process) to the class blog. Include visuals and the research you have completed thus far. We will be giving short presentations of semester projects in process in class next week.

POST 3 (Due 4/12)

WRITTEN COMMUNICATION

Activism through Art Writing Assignment

Post the following writing assignment to the class blog:

Using the Interventionists text book as a resource choose a social or political issue often addressed by artists and activists. Then choose 3-5 projects that intersect/address/critique this theme. Present the ideas of this issue and the various projects that in different ways address similar a similar issue. you may use only artists listed in the text or feel free to use artists that are not listed in the book but that you may find in your own research. How do the artists address the issue? What medium do they use? how do they engage an audience? Why are these challenges to these issues important? How is activism in art different from political activism outside of the art world? Is it?

~800 words, at least 3 artist examples, 3 images and 3 links (portfolio sites, gallery exhibitions, videos etc)

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Due 3/29

READINGS:

Chapter 2 Reclaiming the Streets pg. 63-94 Interventionists

WRITING ASSIGNMENT

Please choose one project from the reading this week. Describe the project, the intention and the method the artist chooses. How does the artist interact/intersect with the audience/public? How does this project illustrate some of the ideas of intervention, public space and ownership?

Please type this answer in 2-3 paragraphs and print it to hand in.

Group 5 presents

two tweets #actsofresistanceAIP

_________________

Class was cancelled due to low attendance last Wednesday 3/15

All assignments below due 3/15 are now due 3/22

We will adjust the syllabus to make up for the lost day

Due 3/15 - now due 3/22

READING: Chapter 1 Nomads pgs. 25-60 Interventionists

Project Proposal printed and handed in to me

~1-2 pages describing what you would like to research and write/present for your semester project. Think about your semester project topic read the project description on our syllabus and choose an artist, movement or civic action that is an act of resistance. As per our discussions and readings thus far in class choose an issue and a player or players working to raise awareness, disrupt or resist the status quo or existing paradigms of oppression etc. This is at it's core a research assignment but it can take many forms. Choose how you might like to approach the assignment and how you will share it with an audience outside of the classroom. Please include in your 1-2 page description the research you have done thus far, list resources, bibliography of scholarship, writing, websites, and other projects. Include at least 4 artists/activists that you found that inspire your project. Describe the subject and production of your project clearly and why you are making this project.

Group 4 presents

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Due 3/1

NO READINGS - research and think about your project topic!

Project Topic (due 3/1):

Think about your semester project topic. Read the project description on our syllabus and note any questions you may have about the assignment. Please write 1 or more ideas you are considering for your project topic. We will be discussing the project assignment in class. I will collect your short list of project ideas in class (you can just write these out on a piece of paper). I will be asking for full project proposals (1 page) due after Spring Break on 3/15.

Group presentations

Be sure all groups create a summary (1-2 paragraphs) of your presentation on the blog with a link to your presentation materials and images. Groups that have already presented please do this immediately if you have not already. Each groups needs only one post. You decide who creates the post for the group. Groups who are yet to present must post their presentations when they are to present.

two tweets #actsofresistanceAIP

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Due 2/22

READINGS:

1. Review Chapter 4 from Interventionists book

WRITING ASSIGNMENT TYPED AND HANDED IN on 2/22

Please choose one project to focus on for class discussion that we have not already discussed in class. How does this project illustrate some of the ideas of alternatives to institutional knowledge, "experimental universities" and how might the artist, the amateur and collective play a part?

Please type this answer in 2-3 paragraphs and print it to hand in.

2. Read the entire Guerilla Girls book

WRITING ASSIGNMENT TYPED AND HANDED IN on 2/22

Please type a general summary of the mission of the Guerilla Girls group and their projects. Choose one project or theme from the book to focus a few paragraphs on decribing. What social and political issues do the Guerilla Girls focus on?

Please type this answer in 5-6 paragraphs and print it to hand in.

Please look at the projects, videos and articles

ONLINE (No writing assignments due for these readings):

Eyebeam Residents Okunseinde and Asega present the Iyapo Repository

http://archive.eyebeam.org/events/iyapo-dc

about creating the future

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fuPvZKEKCYo

Luis Camnitzer "Art thinking"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NItWZPdXfUU

two tweets #actsofresistanceAIP

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Due 2/15

READINGS: Interventionists, Chapter 4 of 111-132

EDIT YOUR AGITPROP POST by Saturday 2/11 Edit format, images for size, add captions to images, fix links and integrate into the text, add a title, add 'Works Cited' or Resources at the bottom, format sources correctly, EDIT the entire post for grammar, spelling etc.

two tweets #actsofresistanceAIP

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Due 2/8

READINGS: Interventionists, Anarchy in the Ruins pg 143-146 and Encyclopedia Entries pg 147-154

Post 1

Agitprop! assignment on the blog

Choose a project from the Agitprop! exhibition and write a short description about it. You may also choose to focus on the Manga and War exhibition or the work of Joshua Rashaad McFadden on exhibition in our NJCU galleries. Please research the artist you choose to inform your writing and description. Be sure to use citations for the information you use. Relate your chosen project to the class readings thus far and the segment of the documentary, Century of the Self, we watched in class.

Then choose a second art project (not in the exhibition) that you connect to the first and compare and contrast them. Describe each project but also include themes in relationship to the other. What is similar? How does each of them reach an audience? Are the messages similar? What themes connect them or set them apart? Who made them? What are some of the philosophies or policies that affect each?

Your short essay must be ~700 words. Be sure to include two images and two links. Assignments must be posted to the blog before 11pm the night before class (2/7).

two tweets #actsofresistanceAIP

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Due 2/1

READINGS: Read through the Agitprop! website at the Brooklyn Museum

https://www.brooklynmuseum.org/exhibitions/agitprop

ON BLACKBOARD

John Berger Ways of Seeing Ch7

Articles online:

Art in America

http://www.artinamericamagazine.com/news-features/news/agitprop-at-the-brooklyn-museum-waves-of-dissent-legacies-of-change/

NYTimes

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/12/18/arts/design/the-art-of-politics-in-agitprop-at-the-brooklyn-museum.html

**Read the readings from last week if you did not already do so and prepare the quotes and description for each reading (last week and this week's readings) for collection in class. See the syllabus under 'Class Participation' for details.

two tweets #actsofresistanceAIP

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Due 1/25

READINGS

John Berger Ways of Seeing Ch7 on BLACKBOARD

Susan Sontag excerpt from On Photography

http://www.susansontag.com/SusanSontag/books/onPhotographyExerpt.shtml

Intro

Who do you think you are?

What is your role in media consumption, critique and/or media making. How much of who you are is measured against media examples and images? How much of our common experience involves shared mass media images, events and stories? Use several media examples to illustrate your description of your relationship to media.

Can you think of ways that the media covers activists, acts of resistance and protest? How do you feel about this relationship? Use examples to illustrate your answers. Your blog post must be at least 4 paragraphs and you must include at least one link and one image.

two tweets #actsofresistanceAIP

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Link to the Syllabus

Link to Class screenings

Link to our twitter hashtag: #actsofresistanceAIP

Discussion guidelines

The course material and discussions can often be provocative and challenging. We must therefore be careful to be respectful of each other and of our viewpoints.

We must come to class prepared and ready to discuss the readings. Please keep discussions focused on the readings and class materials and keep examples relevant and appropriate. If you have not done the readings you are not to participate in the discussion.