Homelessness

     In today's society everywhere we look we see growing crime, prejudice and social and political injustice. One thing we see everyday walking around in our city especially is homelessness. In recent statistic studies there are totalled over 564,708 homeless people in which 50% of them have been over the age of 50. Due to being homeless for long people tend to grow mental illness and diseases while being alone on the streets, it can drive someone to be crazy.

Over years people Just learn to make them part of society and just walk over them as if they are not there, straight up ignore the existences of a human being. As we are noticed in our everyday lives of people  in society I feel as if homeless people  do not get this same "privilege" as us "normal" citizens do. All they want to feel is cared for, some of us look at homeless people as if they are scary as if they are not humans like us. There has been many artist in which have made impact touching on topics including homelessness, one of the main is Krzysztof Wodickzo. Although known for many of his projects the one I would like to focus on is the Homless vehicle he made.

    This vehicle was something to help homeless people survive on the streets. The wagon type silhouette served as many different things to these homless people, first off it extended into a bed for the people to sleep on at night, second off the bottom of the cart had a section for someone to store cans and other things they needed to build up.

Also the vehicle had a compartment which came out and give you a platform to wash ur head and hair in. Nevertheless the reason this was so impactful and so important is because this  project did for homeless people something they never had before, people turning and looking at them, drawing them attention, making it so that they are seen as people just like everyone else. Wodickzo addressed this issue of homeless people being unseen by making something that is very easy to the eye. Another person who made something similar to help homeless people recently is a young woman, 15 years old, by the name Emily Duffy, a student at Desmond college in Limerick. She developed a fireproof and rainproof sleeping bag with Velcro straps just incase the person had to get out of the sleeping bag quickly. She recently showed this project off at the BT Young scientist and technology exhibition in Dublin.

 One of the most known artist in this genre and notable is Michael Rakowitz. He created a project named the "parasite". This was a tent like structure built from inflatable plastic bags. This structure would attatch to the exterior outtake vents of buildings, these blew hot air into the structure which would then give people an insulated tent to sleep in. Although it broke some laws it still made its impact while people were using it.

Rakowitz gave people a harsh taste of reality of how hard it is for homeless people during the winter. The parasite was only distributed to 30 people ranging from Boston to New York City. All three of these artist are to me examples of activism in art, they make something to show people and reach different artist. Activism in art paints pictures for people and let's threm the audience think what they want about the project, paint their own picture, make their own meaning of it. On the other side activism is politics can lead to worse stuff. For example our recent presidential debate led to more segregation than maybe ever. Also not to mention all the riots and violent protest which followed the outcome of the election. Activism through art is a real way of a peaceful protest, it gives people an opportunity to think for themselves instead of getting consumed into what media spits at them.


Links and resources for project

http://www.socialsolutions.com/blog/2016-homelessness-statistics/

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=59DV3k2fVfA

http://www.goodnewsnetwork.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/emily-duffy-duffily-bags-released-Desmond-College.jpg

Artists fighting for the homeless

Rachel George
The Guerrilla Girls asks,"What's the difference between a prisoner of war and a homelessness person?" A homeless person sleeps on hard concrete every night. They have to fight to stay warm and safe at night. Also they wear the same outfit for many days until they can get new ones. A homeless person is a prisoner of war in their own city. Many people do not understand why people become homeless; it could be because the person is out of work or their rent is to high to pay. Today, the housing market has increased, but a persons salaries did not. But artists like Krysztof Wodiczko, Michael Rakowitz, N55, and Andres Serano changes poor people and fortunate people lives with their projects.

People who lose their home might use their car for shelter. Wodiczko was able to create the Homeless Vehicle which was "an  instrument of survival for urban nomads"(26). He created this vehicle with a shopping cart as a shelter so the unfortunate do not have to stay so the unfortunate do not have to stay in one place. Similar to Wodiczko project, his former student, Rakowitz created the paraSITE. This project is "Produced from plastic bags and tape and attached to air vents on buildings"(34). Heat is one of the major problems homeless people have to deal with. Rakowitz project kills two birds with one. Instead of the heat coming out the through the vents going out into the air he attaches plastic bags to the open air vent. Both Wodickzo and Rakowitz used simple materials to help many in need.

A studio apartment in Manhattan may cost up to $3,000.  This same $3,000 you pay every month could be used as a down payment to a payment for people who does not have to worry about becoming homeless because you are not able to pay. The Snail Shell System was a mobile home shaped like a wheel "equipped with air intake valves,... a kitchen pan, kettle, alcohol burner and plastic bags, a pump and a toilet"(60). Why pay for a small apartment you probably are struggling to pay. N55 shows us that you can use what you have to create something beneficial to help others.

An English idiom, a "Picture paints a thousand words." Serano went around New York City streets photographing destitute people he saw. The pictures show their struggles when living on the streets. But then he decided to change the way he captured a picture. According to Art about poverty and Homelessness, he wanted to focus "on personal connectivity and interaction directly." Serano wanted to get to know them and gain trust from the less fortunate. People who joined this movement felt "it is a blessing when someone takes time to interact with them and to acknowledge them as not being invisible." Many businessmen and businesswomen walk pass the homeless people as if they are not human beings and decided to become homeless. Serano allows us to think about ways we can help the homeless more rather than into their cup.

Activism in art and political activism has many similarities. Political activism is a large group coming together marching down streets with signs, chanting for change. In "Protest tackles homelessness", by Broke-Ass Stuart, today in San Francisco people protested to save the homeless people after "when Hizzoner Ed Lee said the ''homeless have to leave" for the Super Bowl". San Francisco is ignoring their own people. However, art activism is either a artist or artists using objects to display a message. For example, these Wodickzo, Rakowitz, N55, and Serano used their passion for art to design either a mobile or photographs to display the simple necessities they do not have. The homeless are people too. Many people become homeless due to losing their home, family issues or become mentally ill. These artists are able to share their stories with their creations. It will only grow if we as citizens continue to walk pass them.

Race and Art

Disclaimer: Before presenting my artists I will address why these artists are important in their field of activism and worth taking note of rather than incoherent babblings of a half-baked idea. In my descriptions of these projects I specifically point out those parts which I find useful and leave out parts that I believe have been diluted away from their original intention. The lack of coverage of these aspects comes from me personally not believing it to be useful not lack of research.

Racism, especially in policing is an issue that occurs due to a reason such as increased crime rates by certain race or ethnicity for the vast majority of occurrences. Racism is a problem even in America the most equal of diverse nations. My theory behind the lagging back and continuing of racism is that it stems from the wage gap. However we have come forward in strides the past century to make our fellow Americans equal in this field. In fact certain racial groups such as Asian Americans and Indian Americans are reporting higher earnings than Whites. The question is why have Indian Americans and Asian Americans progressed so far from the days of racial inequality that they faced when they were performing the most dangerous job of planting and detonating explosives for half the pay of the Hispanic workers. How and why were these racial groups progressing so far while Hispanic and Black people in the work force remained behind? In order to eliminate racism we should focus on what causes the increased rate of criminal activities in Hispanic and Black communities especially since the victims of these crimes tends to be someone of the perpetrator’s own race and therefore doubly sets that race back. This is the wage gap as someone who has money is less likely to commit a crime, especially violent ones than someone who doesn’t.

As previously stated the reason behind the racism in policing, the disparity between racial groups in regards to crime both stem from wage earnings in my opinion. In my researched opinion the reason behind the wage gap is the understanding and sympathy that the majority of people feel towards the race. I believe that in order to close the wage gap which is the source of these race problems we need to promote inter-racial understanding and break down those things that separate us. We should become the melting pot that America is thought to be in actuality. While allowing people to keep their racial identity and remaining respectful of it we must come to understand and accept it in all its detail. The three artists I have chosen are three that I feel do this in varying capacities.

William Pope L – Black Factory

The Black Factory is a van owned by William Pope L that goes to various art exhibits and displays a blow-up igloo of what he describes as Black-ness. This is meant to show people of other races what being black is like and therefore promote understanding between the races and work to bring us all together. William Pope L uses the igloo as his medium to communicate with his audience and engages the audience by popping up in a place that surprises them.

Ruben Ortiz Torres – Hats

Ruben Ortiz Torres is an innovative artists who employs a huge variety of means to deliver his message. Hats is my favorite example and it addresses not only his problems as a Mexican American by giving social commentary and promoting understanding of his and other races through racially charge hats but also addresses issues faced by Native Americans and other racial groups. Hats is my personal favorite project on race issues due to its creativity and the artistic eye grabbing form that it takes often with a clear message.

The public – Black Lives Matter

This project is one that I am both critical of and support. Due to its mixed motivations. While I condemn statement such as “What do we want? Dead cops! When do we want them? Now!” and other such promotions of violence it is important to address issues such as disparaging amounts of young black men being killed by cops. I believe however that the way to accomplish this is by taking a less direct path by promoting race relations rather than protesting. While protesting when done peacefully is good for gathering public support it also is an escalation of an issue rather than an effort to come to an understanding. If the Black Lives Matter protest called for a specific course of action such as retraining cops or decreasing the rate at which cops respond with lethal force then I could more fully support it however at the moment the movement is too disorganized and supports violence to regularly for me to believe in it’s cause.

Homelessness as a Social Issue

    There are many issues, both social and political, that can be seen today. Although there are many members of our society, it does not mean that everyone takes their time to see the issues that are really going on. When this occurs, we must count on those who use their voice or talents to shine a light on these important issues and find a way that they can show others that there is always possible solution. These people are known to be the activists and artists in our communities that focus on social and political issues. We know that an activist is a person who campaigns for some kind of social change. This could be accomplished by protesting, or by using a different form of expression such as art. There are many artists from the past and present that have used their work to demonstrate and express the issues that they believe are important. One of these social issues that a few artists have decided to focus on is the issue involving homelessness.

    Homelessness refers to the condition of those without a permanent dwelling, such as a house or a valid form of shelter. Those who are in fact homeless have trouble finding a safe place to live due to economic or mental health issues. Homelessness is a very important issue that we are facing today. It is seen all throughout the country, in our major cities and in another areas where one wouldn’t necessarily think there were. Even though most of us know about this, we don’t tend to do our best to support them or provide them with what they really need. Most homeless people tend to hold up signs asking for money or for help, but their messages don’t always seem to reach a lot of people. As mentioned before, there are a few people who do act or have taken action in the form of art in order to support those in need.

      One of these artists is Krzysztof Wodiczko. Wodiczko has done many interesting projects, but the one that focuses and addresses the issue of homelessness is his piece titled “Homeless Vehicle”. This vehicle was created in collaboration with the homeless from NYC in about a year long period, from 1988 to 1989. Wodiczko’s idea was to construct an “instrument” or form of shelter for the homeless in urban settings. This vehicle was designed using a shopping cart that was then modified to provide a form of portable shelter and a way to collect cans and bottles. Not only did Krzysztof provide the homeless with a home on wheels, he was able to get the attention of many and engage an audience who is not homeless. Seeing someone walking down the street with a cool modified shopping cart will most likely create controversy. It would raise questions of what they are seeing, which would then lead to the issue behind the project which is homelessness. This is important because it brings awareness to the issue but at the same time, it helps those who are homeless.


    Another artist who did something similar to Wodidczko is artist Michael Rakowitz. Rakowitz’s piece is titled “paraSITE”. This is an ongoing project that was created back in 1998. This project is also a form of shelter for the homeless. Instead of it being a moving shelter on wheels like the “Homeless Vehicle” by Wodiczko, it focuses more on the shelter aspect of homelessness. The project “paraSITE” is an inflatable shelter for the homeless made out of plastic bags and tape. After being taped, the bags are attached to air vents on the outside of buildings. The air that escapes through these vents is used to fill the bags to create a heated tent-like shelter. One of the benefits of this project is that it is also portable since it is easy to take apart and reattach. This project was also a collaborative project with the homeless considering that Rakowitz consulted with homeless individuals on what their needs were. He was able to find a very cheap way to help provide the homeless with a form of shelter. These large inflatable shelters do tend to block some of the walkways in its surrounding. This does cause a problem with those trying to make their way around them, but that is what catches the attention of the non-homeless.

    Andres Serrano is also an artist that has used his position to shine a light on the homeless population. Serrano’s piece is different compared to the two mentioned before. Andres Serrano is well aware of the issue of homelessness on the streets of NYC. Instead of creating a physical object or a form of shelter for the homeless, Serrano’s project mainly focuses on finding a way to express the identity of the homeless by taking their picture. This project is photography based, and the two pieces he's done are titled “Nomads” and "Residents of New York".  At first, Serrano would go around the city with a portable studio and photograph the homeless people. One of the interesting aspects of this project was that the homeless people being photographed would at times pose in a certain way that resembled a heroic pose. These poses represented the way they felt being photographed, which relates to the attention they seek when asking fir help. A few years later Andres Serrano decided to go back and take new pictures. This time he didn’t use his portable studio in order to focus on a direct personal connectivity and interaction between him and the homeless. These photographs still act as a form of awareness because it does show the raw reality of what is to be homeless. This does in a way engage an audience by them witnessing someone who is homeless getting photographed; they would ask themselves why it’s happening. This would make them think about the fact that they are homeless.
 
    Overall, all of these artists find a way to use their position in the art world to create projects that work as a form of activism. The challenges that these projects face is important because they make the issue seem more important to those who whiteness them. They raise awareness and show support to those who cannot find it anywhere else. I believe that activism in art is the same as political activism outside of the art world because they both challenge an issue in the way that raises questions. If there was a difference it would be by the medium they choose to use.

Article with video of the project "Homeless Vehicle":
 http://artmuseum.pl/en/filmoteka/praca/wodiczko-krzysztof-homeless-vehicle-project

Video of how "paraSITE" is set up:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lfqi_oql6ms

Article with more pictures from Serrano's photo series "Nomads" and "Residents of New York":
 https://news.artnet.com/exhibitions/andres-serrano-wants-new-yorkers-to-stop-ignoring-the-homeless-25969

Post three- Melissa Malia

The one artist in the book the interventionist is Krzysztof Wodiczko. He is internationally renowned large-scale slide and video projections. My favorite project that Wodiczko has done was the cart that was to help the homeless. It was part of the exhibition This Will Have Been: Art, Love & Politics in the 1980s. The homeless community has a lot of people that cannot find jobs and homes. Wodiczko tried to help them out with the sleeping carts. In the exhibition, they stated that it stood fully in the middle of the room, the “sleeping mode”, it surrounded by sketches of early prototypes. I think that this project was very meaningful for him to do because it was showing awareness to the fact that we don’t have seen every day. The sleeping carts are to keep the homeless that warm when it’s very cold.

Another artist that I found very interesting is Ha-ha.  Ha-ha is a group of artist that came out in 1988 that addressed the gap between the artist and the audience. Ha-ha is a group made up of artist that have made them up in fourteen years are Richard House, Wendy Jacob, Laurie Palmer, and finally John Ploof. It has over twenty to thirty people that was helped by Ha-ha to make the exhibition Flood. Flood was a built in hydroponic garden that was in a storefront on the north of Chicago. The garden of Flood, grew vegetables (such as kale, collards, mustard greens, swiss chard) and therapeutic herbs for people who have HIV. The storefront has been closed since 1995. This project helped the people who had a disease that could be life threatening.

Another group that I found very was the god of bless Graffiti. This collation was found in 2000 in Chicago to combat the growing nation.  In 2004, the god of bless graffiti had a project where Morgan Puett produced an installation of art work that portrayed the Mass Moca. It was a reference to the textile that Puett brought to the world. I think showing awareness to the world of a text out of art work is very well.  They placed these art works on so many abandoned chimes, and buildings. This group has so many arts on the walls that they put there because they want to have the people know what they go through.

Artist have ways of putting art out there. Some put their cultures in to their work, others work on their art as a peaceful place to get away from the world. Each artist has their own way of doing their art. A young man who only knows of the streets of his hometown, finds abandoned buildings and does graffiti on them. That one person that drives through and sees the art can make it go world-wide.

http://www.walkerart.org/magazine/2012/krzysztof-wodiczkos-homeless-vehicle-project

http://www.hahahaha.org/projFlood.html

http://www.counterproductiveindustries.com/gbgc/call.html

Women Reproductive Right Is In Danger

The battle for women’s reproductive rights is similar to the struggle for African Americans to have “the full liberty of speech in public and private” as Dread Scott found out in 1865 when he petitioned for his personal freedom from slavery and lost. Moreover women’s reproductive rights are akin to defending the rights of racial equality, civil rights, desegregation, same sex marriage, and universal human rights. Every individual should have the right to choose how to live his or her private life in today’s society without governmental interference or control. Abortion had been illegal since 1880 in the United States, unless it was “crucial in saving the woman’s life.” According to the Boston Women's Health Book Collective, by the 1950s, “about one million illegal abortions were performed annually,” resulting in one out of 1,000 women dying in the process. Accordingly, this brought to the forefront the importance of having safe medical treatment for women who underwent these procedures. As a result, beginning in the 1960s, women’s movements began pushing for their rights, including reproductive privacy after being inspired by the civil rights movement a decade earlier. Nevertheless, in the United States, the process of getting the word out to unify women nationwide was slow, but in 1970, the newly organized, National Organization of Women’s, voice was finally heard by legislators. Subsequently, the first state to allow the full right to abortion was New York. As a result, in 1973, abortion was legalized in the U.S. due to the persistence of the feminist’s and women’s movements.At the end of the day, the sole decision on what is best for individual women’s health rests in their own hands.

Social Norms be Damned

                                                   The Idea of Rebellion
      An artist or artist have many ways to view the world. By expressing this view, they are intending on changing a certain error found in society or in ourselves. The artist gathered within this piece intend to show the world how society needs to break free of the idea that contentment and inaction are key to survival. Five artist are key to proving this point and they are N55, Alex Villar, Institute for Applied Autonomy (IAA), The Surveillance Camera Players (SCP), and Yomango. The interacting goal between them is to break free of conformity. These five have the needs of the people in mind and are trying to liberate the self from social norms. The IAA is centered on individual and self-determination, Alex Villar is focused on re configuring public space, N55 is about expanding outside what is a home, Yomango is focusing on breaking free of the corporation, and SCP is focused on demanding privacy.

        Each artist or group has its own way of breaking free from the shell of normality. The first example is N55. They consist of four members whose goal is to "liberate land across the globe" (59). They wish to liberate people from the constraints of normal houses and apartments and to allow people the opportunity to just be free. In terms of practicality, it would be easy to move this mobile home from place to place. It would break down the idea of the home being set in one place and just by thinking up this theoretical idea people can see a home as actually traveling alongside them. There would be absolutely no limitations.

        Looking at the idea of physical presence, the IAA would be the opposite. The Institute of Applied Autonomy is an anonymous organization consisting of artist, engineers, and researchers. Their "mission is to study the forces and structures that affect technologies that serve social and human needs" (75). Their goal is not only to liberate social thinking but to liberate the human needs. These specific needs fall into the category of social protest and protecting the human in volatile environments. By involving themselves, the IAA is changing the rules to protest to make it safer to make powerful impacts in the world.

        Society is very big on social space, making up words such as trespassing and ownership to keep people away from private property. Alex Villar, an artist, directly puts himself at odds with the concept of trespassing, willingly heading straight into it. His intervention consists of "positioning [his body] in situations where the codes that regulate everyday activity can be made explicit" (65). Villar is not trying to invade private property but rather to call attention to the idea of it. People instinctively stay out of lawns and private spaces but it is because society has conditioned this mindset. Villar does the opposite to enforce the notion that our social mentality keeps us from doing as he does.

       Connecting to the idea of trespassing as a form of social awareness, one might look at Yomango next. They are focused on stealing/ shoplifting " as a form of social disobedience and direct action against multinational corporations" (107). Yomango is not keenly engaged in the notion of thievery but rather on the concept of taking matters into your own hands. By stealing from the corporations, they are inciting an act of rebellion by committing the crime. Stealing, to them, is their act of resistance.

      While Yomango is about stealth before cameras, another group is in it for the performance aspect of it. The Surveillance Camera Players (SCP) are a group which " protests the use of surveillance cameras in public spaces in the belief that cameras violate a constitutionality protected right of privacy and free movement" (83). In terms of the visual performance aspect, SCP uses news and the Big Brother image to focus the camera on them. It is not about the attention per say but rather reversing the roles on the camera and in truth, becoming the camera that watches. They are in turn forcing the camera into the role of observer. They are practically saying we are watching you watch us so watch this.

         In end, these five groups of artist use art to force people out of the narrow mindset society has forced them to take. Be it through a mobile home, a protest, thievery, trespassing, or being pro-privacy, these forms of activism call attention to the self. It is forcing people to look at the self as a form of resistance. No one said anyone had to get hurt, just do something that takes you outside the box because outside the box are more possibilities than were previously anticipated. Society has made a wall. It is our job as individuals to simply get over it.

This is link connecting to Alex Villar.
https://medium.com/breaking-into-business
This is a link connecting to N55
http://www.designboom.com/architecture/n55-walking-house/
This is a link connecting to Surveillance Camera Players
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RILTl8mxEnE
This is a link connecting to Institute of Applied Autonomy
http://theinfluencers.org/en/institute-applied-autonomy
This is a link connecting to Yomango
http://beautifultrouble.org/case/yomango/
   

Newark nj black lives matter

Kevin Haynes
Final project


                                                                 BLACK LIVES MATTER

My semester project is about how black lives matter in Newark NJ. The black lives matter is not just a great topic but the best topic for me because I actually live through police officers taking averages of their power. Being a resident of Newark I have seen cops be a heroes and villains. In the 1960's the black panthers party originally called Black Panther party for self-defense was a group of blacks that wanted to protect their people from police brutality. An artist that have witness and I can relate to is mysonne who is a Bronx rapper who does not talk about how we should sell Drugs or make women feel less then equal to men but how everyone is kings and queens. Independent New York rapper Mysonne is embracing his (growing) voice as a representative of the Hip Hop community’s fight against social injustice. The Bronx-born artist has released “T.H.U.G.S.”, a new track expressing his frustrations at how wider society views young Black men across the nation. Rocking a “Police Murder People” statement t-shirt, Mysonne juxtaposes his angst (“Pastors pray for us / Caskets wait for us / Our elders failed us /Now they got hate for us”) with images of those who’ve tragically lost their lives to police brutality and powerful statistics detailing the extensive inequalities people of color in America suffer. http://thesource.com/2015/11/16/mysonne-releases-powerful-new-track-t-h-u-g-s/
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y-jPX51EdaI

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MFQJEQO6GpI


 This is my video that i have created on Black Lives Matter

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8DNVqc9HPEs

Group- Melissa and Tony

We will be presenting our project on Ruben Ortiz-Torres. We spoke about him in class very briefly about his big truck that light up. That was one of his many talents that he has done, which i will talk about his Alien Toy truck. We will also explain one of his baseball caps, photographs that he has taken while in Mexico City, and his foundation of arts. We have some videos of Ruben talking about his latest(2011) exhibitions that he had during that time.

35 Mujeres and Pro Libertad

      When i was a young girl my parents were always political and involved in the communit, especially the Latino community. My mother finally decided to go back to college to finnish her bachlors degree after many,many years of being a stay at home mother.She began attending CCNY around 1995/1996 . During my mother's amazing self transformation,she met some wonderful people who were also attending the Education program, who were  also very active in the politicalcommunity as well. 
    These wonderful people were a great influence onmy mother, and our family in general. They protested with my mother on campous a few times, which i was brought along to join and rally in with them. I have to say, I dont remember many exact details,but i do remember feeling completly empowered and important. I remember feeling likeI was really making a difference in the world just by being there and standing for something that meant alot tomy mother.
     My mother also began attending meetings for an organization named Pro-Libertad. The Pro-Libertad campaign focused onmanypolitical issues sourounding Puerto Rico. At the time the two main issues taht were focused on were "freeing" Puerto Rico fromtheUnited States, making them their own country again,and freeing the 14 Puerto Rican Political prinsoners (at the time there were 14). We attended organization meetings, protests, Rally's until I was about 14 or 15 years old. My parents continued to be affliated with the organization a bit after i stoped attending meetings,and eventually stopped being politacally active all together. 
      I didnt realize how much i missed being involved and interested in being affliated with a political organization. Now here we are about 17/18 years later, and i plan onbecoming involved with Pro Libertad again, and another organization that they are affliated with named, 35 mujeres.
     When i began doing research for this project i found one of the light blue shirts that i used to wear to our protests and meetings when i was younger had two phone numbers on the back of the shirt. I decdied to call those numbers just to see what happened. Thefirst number directed me tona voicemail, i left a message explaining who i was and the project that i wasdoing. The second number rang a bit, but a woman picked up. I was super excited andnervous at the same time. She told me that her name is Esperanza Martell, and that she was once a huge part of pro libertad, and now is focusing on another movemet which she helped to organize named 35 mujeres. 35 mujeres is an activist group that is focusing on freeing one of the remaining (of the 14 original) Puerto rican political prisoners. I spoke with Espreanza briefly and explained to her  how i am doing a project about different forms or artistic activism for a class project and that i was interested in doing some feild work and  getting back into the activist scene. She was very warm and helpful and said that i could come and join the group in advocating for the release of Oscar Lopez Rivera. She told me that 35  Mujeres gets together every last Sunday of each month on 44^th street and broadway in new ork city, times square. The chanting begin at 4pm and lasts until 4:35pm. It 35 minutes of chanting, I belive the 35 is derived from the 35 years that Oscar has been in prison. I found a video clip from last year and it said “34 mujeres” and they were chanting stating that he had been inprisoned for 34 years, so im asuming that each year that Oscar is in jail, the women add another number to their name. This will be one of my questions whe I speak to esperanza on Sunday November 27, 2016 so that I can be 100% certain. Espreanza also said that when I come to the chant on November 27, 2016, that I can interview  few people and posibily even her, if things aren’t too hectic at the moment. She also said for me and who ever comes with me to wear light blue and pink and to bring noise makers.
            As of right now, I am planning attending each meeting (the last Sunday of every month) and creating a Blog after each meeting. I would begin small, and as I learn more about the cause I would be writing and comenting about other organzitions that are afiliated with Pro Libertad and 35 Mujeres. In addition, I would also like to create a twiter account that would bring more attention to the cause, because as of right now the two groups are on a very limited amount of social Media.

http://www.hartford-hwp.com/archives/43/003.html

http://www.nytimes.com/1999/09/08/us/12-imprisoned-puerto-ricans-accept-clemency-conditions.html

http://digitalcommons.law.yale.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1014&context=yjll

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/jul/10/puerto-rico-last-political-prisoner-oscar-lopez-rivera

https://www.facebook.com/events/116440038824759/

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

Mental Illness

Rachel George

          Richard Carlson, an American Author says, "Stress is nothing more than a socially acceptable form of illness." Stress seems to be normal because everyone is talking about, but doing nothing about it. A person who is stress might have headaches more often than a person usually get; or feels tired all the time. These little signs people always ignore leads to serious diseases such as cardiovascular disease or Alzheimer's disease. Rob Haskell, writer in fashion magazine and psychiatrist, writes in Vogue magazine, "Under Pressure", about anxiety among adolescents. Haskell tells us that we bypass mental illness. Toby Allen, freelance illustrator, brings mental illness to life; he imagines how mental illness should not be ignored because it is take over people's lives, especially the younger generation.
          Haskell's young patients is where he notices anxiety a lot. He begins with a story about his fifteen year old patient whose parents are Honduran went to the beach for a swim. When he goes into the water, all he remembers is himself trying to gasp for air. Then he tells Haskell, I figured that eventually I would get to tired and then just basically drown...But typical me, I can't even die right"(225). To hear a young boy wanting to die is scary. He is tired of living. Haskell learns that Joseph worried about many things: "Would he ever grow taller than five feet six? Could he ever bring a girl home to see the apartment where he slept with his brother on a foldout sofa in the living room?"(225). He worried so much about simple things about himself. It is as if he does not like himself. As psychiatrist or parent, this should never be ignored.
         Sometimes parents cannot understand why their children act the way they do. Joseph's  mother did not understand why her son acted the way he did. For example, "His mother took his shyness for defiance and complained for his refusal to run simple errands for her, such as stopping by the butcher on his way home"(225). Joseph's mother at the time probably thought that because he is a teen, he is just acting out. However, she is not the only parent who does not know the reasons for their child's behavior. Haskell states, "it may be the    case that the wealthier and more stable we become...the more easily we turn our attention to..."internalizing" conditions"(226). As long as people are making their money, the more they forget about keeping their mental health as normal. People are not aware of the importance of their mental health.
         Allen's art illustrates anxiety, depression, anorexia nervosa, schizophrenia, misophonia, and many more. These creatures are created with "dark colours...heavy and oppressive feelings...the shock of bright pink represents the intense rush of fear or anxiety", said Allen. The colors express the feelings of people with a mental illness. Also he describes what the creature is capable of doing. For example, Paranoia has "tall ears like a radar, scanning the area for any activity...the monsters ears are almost useless...tight curled...thick fur...often hears the wrong thing." Paranoia is a mental disorder where delusions of something horrifying occurs. This is one out of many mental illnesses that are attacking many people because we dash it off.

Project Summary~ Rachel, Irene, and Kevin

Guerrilla Girls

Guerrilla Girls began in 1985. The women hide their faces with Guerrilla masks.  To hide their identity, they use dead female artists names. They visited various countries such as New York, L.A, Minneapolis, Istanbul, and Shanghai. They used art to brings people attention to problems in art museums. Also to problems like abortion and homeless people.  Famous museums like the Whitney Museum of American Art Biennial exhibition and Guggenheim Museum did not include much women and African American women at the museums. On top of all this, the Guerrilla Girls received either much love or hate for their activism.

Cyberwarfare

  For my semester project I am going to try and inform you on cyberwarfare and acts of resistance people have taken using this tool. These key board warriors wage wars digitally in the dark net, people can stay anonymous and leave no trace at all. Now in days computer and advanced technology is so easily accessible to everyone around the world. In particular this technology is more than available for every government also. For example in March 2013 South Korean major banks and broadcast stations were shut down and over 30,000 computers were affected. Also in 2014 when Sony released the movie “The Interview”, a group named “Guardians of Peace” wanted them to pull the film due to the comedy plot about killing the North Korean leader Kim Jong-un. The group released an enormous amount of Sony files containing employees and their families person emails and information about all salaries.
   The group that I would like to focus on and inform people more about is anonymous and all the acts of resistance they have done against people. Anonymous is a group of so called “hactivists”. They seek mass revolution and awareness against anything they feel is corrupt. They have a very impactful past dating back to almost 2006, and they still are around. They have done stuff in 2007 like tracking down an alleged internet sex predator and got him arrested to now in 2016 anonymous Philippines forced them to add security to vote count machines.
  In conclusion people may not know but hackers are one of the most dangerous form of terrorism and it is to the point now that some countries even have it as a part of their military. Hacking websites and hacking in general is so serious people are using is for fraud and to hack into banks and steal money. Despite the hardness of being traced the prison sentences are also long. Governments and countries also use computer hacking to keep track of citizens and surveillance around the city

EDUCATION AND FEMINISM

My project is on feminism having an impact education and schooling.Feminists believe society is male control.Feminists also think that society is based on competing between the sexes. They believe that women have been deprived in society and that men historically have had more power than women. Feminists believe this is wrong and needs changing. Many feminists believe that women are being suppressed by a male-dominated society both in education and also later in life. They argue that the curriculum is more based around traditionally male-dominated subjects. Thus it sets up men more than women for further education or more prosperous work opportunities. Coupled with this is the stereotypical view of a woman’s part in society of becoming housewives, marrying early and having children. Feminists argue that this contributes to the suppression put on women by the male-run society.

Feminism, Advertisement and Edward Bernay

                                     Feminism and Advertisement

             My semester project will be on the advancement of advertisement and propaganda and its affect on women past, present and future. I want to discuss how certain groups such as the Feminism movement with the First and Second wave, were so affected by the growth in visual media. This would involve a timeline in which I document the progression of visual advertisement as a form of propaganda and as a form of activism. Also relevant is how the movement was furthered encouraged by Edward Bernay. I especially want to bring up the pro's and con's that derived from Bernay's version of advertisement.

               My goal is to show how media has changed with the involvement of behavioral psychology and how this in turn has affected women in their psyche and physical body. Furthermore, I will use my extreme distaste for the man to show how he has partially altered the existence in which are live in currently. More so, I will give actual instances that prove that Bernay did in fact ruin my present as well as the future we seek to reach towards.

            The fact that he is related to Sigmund Freud and is his nephew, he still will remain, in my eyes, as an individual who managed to screwed up everyone's individuality by associating it with physical, materialistic things.  His involvement in the media was key in affecting the way visual images stimulate people each day. There have been books filled simply discussing his ideas and theories in regards to people as a mob mentality. As a corporation I would have loved it, as in individual I feel great disdain. This sense of disgust is perfect in further dissecting the ways Bernay is the guilty party that revolutionized the way media functions.

              However, although I may not feel inclined to praise or feel gratitude, I feel the need to point out the many activist parities did advance because the media became more focused on sending messages to a crowd. This is where propaganda comes to mind. Whether it was borrowed or not, Bernay has to be recognized as someone who drastically affected women to this day. Feminism has changed the way we perceive women and equal rights today. I feel quite keenly towards expressing just how much Bernay helped the movement.                                  
     
     

Human Trafficking

I will be writing and presenting my project on human trafficking. Human Trafficking is the illegal movement of people, typically for the purposes of forced labor or commercial sexual exploitation. Every day someone is being used for either cleaning or as a sex toy. Slave and sex traffickers are very well known in everything they do. They are using force to keep them under their wing and to keep them quiet so they don’t tell anyone. We never know when someone is under the force of traffickers. They might be right next door of us and wouldn’t even know it. The house next to a school might be a trafficking house.

Human trafficking is supposedly bringing in millions of dollars per year. It is also the first that brings in so much money, the next one is drug trafficking. It is the most crime filled from the police that they hide from. Traffickers fear law enforcement, so they like it to bring different cultures, languages, and other races into the mix.

The most used trafficking is commercial sex. They are being forced to have sex with random guys that are paying a lot of money to get what they want.  From shows that I’ve watched, shows that they make a website that looks like a shopping website. They see what girl that want to have sex with, and they message the pimp. Soon after, they set up a meeting place where the girl dresses in a coat, goes to the hotel and from there its trafficking. If their “customer” or the girl does not do what they are suppose, the customer normally gets off, because they don’t know what goes on beyond the doors. But the girl normally gets hit, or forced to something that they shouldn’t.

A sex trafficker’s survivor made a memoir about her experience, Girls Like us.  She explains on how it was on her and the family of the sex traffickers. I will be buying the book to explain this in more detail.

A story that I found online about a flight attendant learned about sex trafficking was very interesting. An unidentified woman stated that she would have never thought about human trafficking as a problem till today. She stated that her airline started giving training lessons on how to identify it. How do they identify? They see how the person reacts, if they answer for themselves. If they avoid eye contact, if they feel scared or anxious.  If they have their own movement and can go anywhere by themselves.

She also stated that the one time she was on a plane that she came across a group of young girls that did not speak English. She thought it was weird that they weren’t speaking, but she didn’t think much of human trafficking. She then went to ask for her retired mother about it, and her mother said that in her day of work, she also came across something like that.

Another story of an airline being aware of human trafficking. An airline attendant named Sandra Fiorni saw an 18-year-old girl with a newborn that came onto the plane with the umbilical cord still attached. She said in her testimony that she only had one bottle of milk and two diaper on her. At the time, she did not find anyone to put a report in on it. She then noticed that she had to do something about it.

I will also be reading more into the Girls like us book, and see if there are any interviews on the girls 

that are in the book, or the author.  Also be doing a lot more research on how the police do their job on protecting the young girls. 

„https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hh5CtZo6-vE

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SIjKa_4FWfI

Body Shaming

           For some reason, this generation is very involved in worrying what people’s bodies look like, and humiliating them if it’s something that doesn’t fit the “standards.” Body shaming is usually known as discriminating against people who are overweight, but it may also be towards women who are seen to be “too skinny”. With so many feminism issues, body shaming just adds to the hardships of trying to be a confident woman. 

 Everywhere around the world, social media and advertisements of all sorts, contribute to body shaming. An embarrassingly large number of advertisements always show intensely skinny girls. One of the world’s most popular advertisements is created by the Victoria Secret franchise. Victoria Secret is known as the company who shows off their merchandise with only the “skinniest and the prettiest” girls; guys want to have them, and girls want to be them. But who is to say that, that body is the “ideal body?” Who determines who has a better body than someone else? And why does it matter? 

Women all over the world feel as if they are compelled to live up to these standards that society has created for women. God forbid someone is overweight, because then they’re too ugly. Or, if someone is too skinny, then no one will want them. Society nowadays is all about judging others and how they look, but not many come to realize that no one’s opinion but their own matters, and they need the validation from others. While there are so many advertisements and companies contributing to body shaming, there as just as many artists and stars who fight against it.

Artist Mireille Suzanne Francette Porte, or better known as Orlan, held a strong stance against body shaming. After going through surgery for an ectopic pregnancy, she realized she enjoyed the art of surgery, and the feeling. She then went under nine different surgeries to alter her face. Each surgery intended to rewrite western art on her own body. She did not go through these surgeries because she was at risk, or to alter her self to make her look “better.” She did it because she believed  surgically changing her body could be a powerful work of art. One operation altered her mouth to imitate François Boucher's Europa, another to mimic the brow of Leonardo's Mona Lisa, and another altered her chin to look like that of Botticelli's Venus.

Orlan was asked if she was trying to make herself more beautiful. She responded with, "No, my goal was to be different, strong; to sculpt my own body to reinvent the self. It's all about being different and creating a clash with society because of that. I tried to use surgery not to better myself or become a younger version of myself, but to work on the concept of image and surgery the other way around. 

Is it her aim to change the idea of beauty? Orlan says, "I am not sure I can change such a thing, but I can produce images that are different from those we find in comics, video games, magazines and TV shows. There are other ways to think about one's body and one's beauty. If you were to describe me without anyone being able to see me, they would think I am a monster, that I am not fuckable. But if they see me, that could perhaps change."

           Orlan is an interesting artist because so many people use plastic surgery as a way to make themselves “better,” so they can fit other people’s standards and have bigger breast or a skinnier torso. Orlan twists this idea and makes it the complete opposite. She doesn’t care what others thinks of her, especially after she completed all here surgeries.

 

Rachel George Semester Project: Mental Illness

Rachel George 

Toby Allen is freelance illustrator who used art to create monsters as a mental illness.  Allen has 
struggled with a mental illness, anxiety. The first illness he drew was anxiety. Before he draws a mental illness, he does a lot of research. Then he begins to imagine how anxiety looks to him based on the research and his imagination.  In each mental illness, he describes what this monster does to people. Also Allen uses dark colors and the color pink because "the dark colours effect the heavy and oppressive feelings...the shock of bright pink represents the intense rush of fear or anxiety". Mental illnesses mentally and physically affect the way a person view the world which is negative. Everything does not seem to be going right. Allen wants to get people's attention to how serious mental illnesses are. Mental illnesses can have a serious affect on not only the brain , but the heart as well. 

Semester Project Proposal: Black Lives Matter Movement

     For hundreds of years the African American community in the United States has been the subject of discriminatory actions and racism. The systematic racism and discrimination led to a call for change. Throughout American history citizens fought for equal rights and treatment for Blacks, with prime examples being the Civil Rights movement and the Black Lives Matter movement. For this reason, the focus of this project will be on the real issue of racial discrimination against black people and the act of resistance known as the Black Lives Matter movement.

The Black Lives Matter movement was first created back in 2012 after the death of Trayvon Martin. Martin’s murderer George Zimmerman was acquitted of his crime, and dead Trayvon was placed on trial for his own murder. This created a lot of protests that managed to build up action that soon leads to the creation of the hashtag #BlackLivesMatters on social media. This movement itself was a call to action and a response to what seemed to be anti-Black racism. In this project, I will provide more information about this information along with reports from the Trayvon Martin case.

Extensive research will be done on past events (slavery, the Civil Rights movement) and current events (the various shootings of Black individuals) which will serve as evidence that discrimination is occurring. I will go back to old reports that extend from slavery to the Civil Rights movement. The Civil Rights movement was a social movement in the United States whose goal was to end racial segregation and discrimination. This movement will be used as a reinforcement and a mirror image to the movement that is occurring today in order to support the message they both share. The mass media will play a big role in this project and it will be discussed as a way of raising awareness on issues. I will speak about the negative and positive impacts of the media during the movement. There is a lot of evidence that show that there are still issues involving African Americans. I will also speak about current issues, such as the reaction to results of the 2016 election.

Artist from previous class readings will be used to support the idea of this movement. One of them being from the Agitprop Exhibition, which includes artist Dread Scott and his piece titled “On the Impossibility of Freedom in a Country Founded on Slavery and Genocide”. Scott's piece was used to show the concept of "the struggle for freedom", which also references the Civil Rights struggle faced in Birmingham Alabama. Other artists from my own research will also be used to support the movement. One of these artists is Nate Hill, who is also an African-American man who has done pieces based on racial issues. Hill’s piece is titled "The White Ambassador", where he challenges the idea of reverse racism between Whites and Blacks. This art piece will be used to show that racism can be an issue both ways. Overall, this project will include a written essay focusing on the Black Lives Matter Movement along with a blog/website dedicated to supporting the movement.  

Project Summary ( MONEY TO BURN) -Victor and Rhoda

Money to burn is a performance that was Illustrated on Wall Street. Dred Scott started with to $250 and he burned it. While encouraging Traders and other people to join him and burn their money. Burning money is it taboo but at the same time his performance only made physical on what happens on stock markets around the globe everyday. Police intervened after 25 minutes and stop the act 15 minutes later.

Selfie: Us and Them

     The art exhibition, "Selfie: Us and Them" was absolutely breathtaking and amazing, and those are understatements. I have never been to an art exhibition quit like this one, from the moment that I walked in I was diffidently in awe. When i first heard the name of the exhibition, I assumed that the gallery would be full of a bunch of women taking different types of selfies of themselves with different backgrounds and angles. I didn't think it would be boring or a waste of my time, but never in a million years would I have thought that it was going to be as beautiful and original as it turned out to be.
  
    When I first entered the exhibition, walked into that tiny room in the back of the Art gallery, I was hit with pure, raw, intense talent. I was not only amazed by the originality and thought that was put into the artwork, but I loved how in-depth and how much honesty, pain, intensity and so many other emotions were put into their masterpieces. (173) I was absolutely floored by the raw beauty in each and every piece. I had the honor of speaking to the extremely talented women who created and put together this exhibition, and felt honored to be able to gain a deeper grasp and better understanding of how they created these objects of pure beauty.
All of the artists were so amazing in so many different ways.
   
     As soon as i walked into the art show, I was absolutely taken aback with the pure talent in all of the artworks that were being presented, but there were two artist who stood out to me the most. It is not because their artwork or skills were any better than the others, it was because there was so much mystery, yet familiarity in the pieces of artwork. The two exhibitions which stood out the most to me, were the video piece by Mediha Sandhu and the statue of an upper torso, which was located on the lower right hand corner, when entering the exhibition (I am not sure of the artist's name). 

     Upon entering the "Selfie: Us and Them" exhibition, the first piece of artwork that instantly caught my attention was (374)  an exquisite and emotional video being displayed on the right hand side of the gallery. It was the artwork by Mediha Sandhu. The video was full of pain, anger, loneliness, vulnerability, confliction, and most of all, frustration. Her video showed different images of herself  expressing so many complex emotions.  As I stood there, and watched the images changing on the television screen in front of me a whole bunch of different emotions ran through me. I actually felt the urge to cry, because the artist was clearly at a crossroads, and the pure frustration jumped out from the exhibit and touched me. In the piece, Mediha wore her Hijab. The video had static and image noise, as you see the young lady in the pulling at her Hijab, holding her face while screaming, holding her head while looking down, and at one point her face is blanked out. Words cannot begin to explain how much this artwork touched me.
    
  I have many friends who are Muslim and who have struggled with the abuse of society. They've told me how utterly painful and frustrating it is to be abused on a daily basis just because of their Religion. I had the pleasure of actually meeting and  speaking with Mediha, which gain a better understanding of what she endures from society. She explained tome that this piece was based on the emotions that she feels when she is faced with bigotry and pure hate from people who take one look at her Hijab and assume that she is an evil terrorist.
    
    Mediha and I spoke about politics and how this presidential election is making it even worse for Muslims. We spoke about how Trump being so vocal when being racist and hateful, allows people who were racist to feel justified and now they are acting out towards certain groups of people worse than they did before. We spoke of how apparently now a days is totally okay and acceptable to be a huge racist. We spoke of how this happened to Jewish people, Japanese people, Italian and Irish people, and so many other groups in the past.
    
    This piece of artwork allows the viewer to momentarily feel what Mediha feels on a daily basis. By putting herself out there the way that she did was an act of resistance in itself. She is bringing awareness and importance to her cause by exposing her raw emotion the way that she did. Both Mediha and her fascinating art piece opened my eyes in so many ways. The point of an activist piece of artwork is to bring and spread awareness to others about a certain cause or problem, and that is exactly what Media did through her inspiring artwork. With such an influential art piece, it allows people to feel and gain a deep understanding for what the artist is feeling, and then the audience is so moved and inspired that they talk about the problem on hand with others and possibly even looking into additional ways to bring awareness. Mediha's Artwork has done that for me. I have been talking to many, many people about her work and about how badly Muslim people are treated and how they are even ignored by society due to Racism and fear. My daughter and I (yes, my 10 year old daughter) have been brainstorming on different ways we can bring awareness to this huge issue. For now, we are just being very vocal and putting the topic out there in conversations with different people. One person can make a difference, just my touching and getting through to just 1 person, and Mediha has done that!
     
     The other piece of artwork which I loved, though at first I didn't even notice it was there, was the statue that was placed on the floor in front of a mirror. Once I noticed it, I was confused as to what the meaning of this piece of artwork. I stared at it for a while in awe, there was something about it that engaged me, it was intriguing and drew me in. The statue is not the most beautiful thing at first glance, but once one really looks at it, the beauty is found in its imperfections. After speaking to the artist ,i learned more about the piece and found it even more beautiful.
     
     The artist used her own mother for this spectacular piece of artwork. She gave her mother art plaster and had her mother incase her entire upper torso in it, including her head and face. She explained to me that the reason that she did this is for people to realize their imperfections, but yet there is beauty in every imperfection. I just looked at her as she spoke and realized how true that is, yet we tend not to see the beauty in our own imperfections because everyone is concerned about fitting into society's mold of what's "beautiful".
     
    The statue was lumpy, one breast was larger than the other, one arm was larger than the other, the head was a bit misshaped, and yet its was absolutely stunning. What made this statue even more meaningful to me, was that it was made of and by the artist's mother with the supervision and direction of the artist. I fell in love with everything this piece stood for.       
      What made this piece an act of resistance is that the artist is forcing us to look at all of our "imperfections" and embrace them. Everything that way hate about ourselves and find "ugly", are actually beautiful. Our uniqueness is what's beautiful. As a society we must love ourselves and all of our "imperfections", and stop judging ourselves and others on beauty and ugliness. This piece really touched and inspired me because I have such low self esteem and always find fault in my imperfections ,I hated even looking in the mirror. Now, I look in the mirror and I can find beauty in what I see, because its my imperfect body, and I love myself!
    
    The whole exhibit and all of the Artists opened my eyes in so many ways. The "Selfie" exhibit forced me to look at myself, love myself, and appreciate my whole self, not just certain things about myself like I did before. The whole experience was so amazing and I felt truly blessed to be able to experience such a powerful movement. All of the people involved in this exhibition are incredibly talented and true leaders. Thanks you all for inspiring me and helping me to grow to be a better person. I will diffidently keep all of their lessons alive through my daily routines and experiences.