Tania Bruguera Tania Bruguera is an installation and performance artist who frequently addresses the political climate in Cuba and the world, and also the founder of the Hannah Arendt International Institute for Artivism.
Nasty Women Pedro Lasch’s video on experimental pedagogy and self-organized platforms made me think of my best friends trip to Washington D.C. last year. The controversial election of Trump this past year lead many women and men to the streets in protest all over the nation. The aim being to stand together in solidarity against the hostile … Continue reading "Azania House"
The Great Wall of Los Angeles Considering the concept of monumentality in public art, I was led back to murals and their impact on spatial politics. The Great Wall in Los Angeles is a mural project begun by Judy Baca in 1974 that stretches over half a mile through the Tujunga Flood Control Channel. Over the course of four summers, the project employed … Continue reading "Azania House"
Pilvi Takala Pilvi Takala, a Finnish artist, typically trespasses in smaller microcosms, using herself or hired actors and a hidden camera to document a single, subtle act of transgression of established social conduct. In doing so, she unsettles the unspoken rules of these ambiguous societies. Takala, with her unassuming but stubborn demeanour, has just the right tenor … Continue reading "Azania House"
Azania House As part of the #RhodesMustFall movement which began in March 2015 at the University of Cape Town in South Africa, students occupied the administrative “Brenner” building and renamed it “Azania” house. Deeming Azania House a center for decolonial thought and home for student movements, students used the occupied building as a base for the continued … Continue reading "Azania House"
Nicolas Bourriaud Curator, art critic, and scholar. Bourriaud is best known among English speakers for his publications Relational Aesthetics (1998/English version 2002) and Postproduction (2001). Relational Aesthetics in particular has come to be seen as a defining text for a wide variety of art produced by a generation who came to prominence in Europe in the early … Continue reading "Azania House"
Coco Fusco and Guillermo Gómez-Peña In March 1992, writer/artist Coco Fusco and performance artist Guillermo Gómez-Peña locked themselves in a cage and performed as “Amerindians,” wearing masks and converse sneakers, typing on laptops and making Vodou dolls. As the exhibit travelled from Irvine, CA to the Smithsonian in DC and London and Madrid, the artists blurred boundaries between subject and … Continue reading "Azania House"
