In marking the one year anniversary of the catastrophic BP oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico, I signed a letter of protest along with 165 other arts professionals and activists that appeared in the Guardian on April 20, 2011. Titled Tate should end its relationship with BP, the letter calls on the Tate Gallery of London “to demonstrate its commitment to a sustainable future by ending its sponsorship relationship with BP.”

The letter reads in part:

“In the year since their catastrophic oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico, BP have massively ramped up their investment in controversial tar sands extraction in Canada, have shown to be a key backer of the Mubarak regime in Egypt and have attempted to commence drilling for oil in the Arctic Ocean. While BP continues to jeopardize ecosystems, communities and the climate by the reckless pursuit of ‘frontier’ oil, cultural institutions like Tate damage their reputation by continuing to be associated with such a destructive corporation.”

Signatories to the letter include the likes of writer and art critic Lucy R. Lippard, painter John Keane, artist and Stuckist co-founder Charles Thomson, artist Billy Childish, and many others. Anti-corporate globalization activist and author of The Shock Doctrine, Naomi Klein, was also a signatory.

While directed at the Tate, the Guardian letter by implication calls upon all art institutions to end their partnerships with BP specifically and with oil companies in general. I first began writing about the relationship between BP and the Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA) in 2007. The Director of LACMA, Michael Govan, had just accepted a $25 million “gift” from BP, monies the museum would use in part to build a new entry gate, the ill-named “BP Grand Entrance”. That first muckraking article was followed by a multitude of other commentaries and critical essays that further exposed the saga of BP and LACMA; by the look of things this current post will not be my last entry on the matter.

Since the BP disaster in the Gulf of Mexico exactly one year ago, much has been learned about the oil company’s affairs. PLATFORM brought to light the oil giant’s close relationship with former dictator of Egypt, Hosni Mubarak, now under investigation for ordering the murder of hundreds of protestors during the three-week long pro-democracy uprising that toppled his regime. Last February I wrote about the collaboration between BP and Colonel Muammar Gaddafi - a friendly and quite lucrative business relationship that culminated in a deal worth billions. On April 16, 2011, Al Jazeera published an in-depth report by independent U.S. journalist Dahr Jamail. His BP anniversary: Toxicity, suffering and death is about as excoriating an account of corporate and government irresponsibility likely to be found.

On April 19, 2011, The Independent published Secret memos expose link between oil firms and invasion of Iraq, a timely report that verifies the U.K. government was holding meetings with BP, Shell and BG (British Gas), on “post regime change” opportunities for oil exploitation - a year before the war on Iraq began. Minutes from one Nov. 2002 government meeting with BP noted; “Iraq is the big oil prospect. BP is desperate to get in there and anxious that political deals should not deny them the opportunity.” At another meeting held in Oct. 2002, the government’s Foreign Office Middle East director noted, “Shell and BP could not afford not to have a stake in Iraq for the sake of their long-term future. We were determined to get a fair slice of the action for UK companies in a post-Saddam Iraq.” Indeed, after the war, BP was awarded 20-year contracts on some of the largest of Iraq’s oil fields containing upwards of 60 billion barrels of oil.

Here the reader should be reminded that in a 2007 interview in the Los Angeles Times, LACMA Director Michael Govan offered a truly laughable justification for taking BP’s millions - he cited the oil giant’s “commitment to sustainable energy.” Since then Mr. Govan has fallen silent regarding the matter of BP sponsorship of the Los Angeles County Museum of Art. One must ask why in all these years the Los Angeles Times has published only a single article that questions the wisdom of LACMA taking money from BP. Art critic Christopher Knight offered a mild rebuke of Govan in his May 18, 2010 article, BP Grand Entrance at LACMA looking not-quite-so-grand, but the article was hardly an in-depth critique that offered solid details on BP’s terrible record.

A protestor from the U.K. activist group, Liberate Tate, stages an intervention titled "Human Cost" at the Tate Britain on April 20, 2011. Photo: anonymous.

Also occurring on the one year anniversary of the BP oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico, artists from the U.K. activist group, Liberate Tate, staged an intervention they titled “Human Cost” at the Tate Britain.

On Wednesday April 20, 2011, a number of silent figures peacefully entered Duveens Hall of the Tate where the exhibit Single Form: The Body in Sculpture from Rodin to Hepworth is currently on display; the exhibit is part of a series of “BP British Art Displays” staged throughout the Tate.

A nude member of the Liberate Tate group assumed a fetal position on the floor in the middle of the room, while veiled comrades dressed in black poured what appeared to be oil over him from containers emblazoned with BP logos (the substance was actually ground charcoal and sunflower oil).

The motionless naked man, slick with viscous black goo, looked as if he were trapped in the globs of crude oil dumped into the Gulf of Mexico by BP exactly one year ago. Eventually museum security directed  museum goers out of the room, placing a screen around the area to hide the action from public view. In due course the protestors left the museum and a clean-up crew dealt with the aftermath. To my knowledge there were no arrests. Photographs of the entire happening can be viewed here. A video produced by “You and I Films” documenting the “Human Cost” intervention can be viewed here. England’s Channel 4 also broadcast coverage of the event.

Sandra Paige, a participant in the intervention/performance, said the following about her group’s action; “It’s astonishing that Nick Serota and other Tate executives can be so blind to the horrific social and environmental impacts that BP is responsible for around the world. From the destruction of fisher folks’ livelihoods in the Gulf of Mexico, to the indigenous communities in Canada fearing for their very survival – the human cost of BP’s oil extraction is staggering.”

Terry Taylor of the Liberate Tate group said of the April 20 intervention; “Many important cultural institutions have been the victim of the government’s cuts in arts funding recently. The fact that many organizations will be actively looking for new funding means that the debate around the ethics of corporate sponsorship is more important than ever. Oil companies like BP are responsible for environmental and social controversy all over the world, and we can’t let their sponsorship of institutions like Tate detract from that fact.”

Flash mob "Sleep-In" protestors occupying the Tate Modern on April 17, 2011. Screen-shot from the video shot by "You and I Films".

April 20 was the culmination of a BP Week Of Action called by U.K. groups Liberate Tate, Art Not Oil, Climate Camp London, UK Tar Sands Network, Climate Rush, Indigenous Environmental Network, and London Rising Tide. Under the slogan of “BP and culture: time to break it off”, the groups held a number of public campaigns, the most amusing of which was an April 17 mass flash mob occupation and sleep-in at the Tate Modern, where some 100 protestors with BP-branded blankets, pillows, pajamas, teddy bears, and alarm clocks held a sleep-in among the art works. A video produced by “You and I Films” documenting the Great BP Sponsored Tate Modern Sleep In can be viewed on YouTube.

"Sleep-In" protestor at the Tate Modern - Sunday, April 17, 2011. Screen-shot from the video shot by "You and I Films".

Gallery visitors were told that BP sponsorship of the arts was “sleep walking us into climate crisis” and “BP’s relationship with this gallery is one of the ways that BP buys our acceptance - it tries to distract us from the crimes against people, from the crimes against the environment, that they are currently conducting around the world. We are here because we believe that sponsorship is part of the massive PR offensive that BP is engaged in all the time.”

In reporting on the April 20 “Human Cost” intervention at Tate Britain, Channel 4’s Matthew Cain said the following; “An over-reliance on corporate funding of any description can lead to a climate of creative caution and conservatism, and at worst, fear.  There’s evidence of this in the US but, although our model of arts funding is slowly moving closer to the American model, so far there doesn’t seem to be any evidence of it here.”

Matthew’s comments are certainly stinging, and it pains me that here in the United States - where BP virtually destroyed the Gulf of Mexico - there are no mass protests marking the one year anniversary of America’s largest ecological disaster. This makes the signing of the Guardian protest letter by American artists that much more noteworthy. I am proud to stand with all those calling for an end to oil company sponsorship of the arts. Hopefully the April 20th actions in the UK will be an inspiring preamble to similar events in the United States.

On February 26, 2011, the publisher and co-editor of Visual Art Source and ArtScene, Bill Lasarow, released an open letter to the arts community entitled, “On Strike from the Huffington Post.” The opinion piece is a call for artists and arts writers to “go on strike” against the Huffington Post over labor and content issues; the call no doubt coming in reaction to media giant AOL purchasing the Huffington Post for $315 million on Feb. 7, 2011. AOL has also given Huffington oversight over all of AOL’s media properties. Specifically Mr. Lasarow calls for two demands to be met by the Huffington Post before the strike can end, that a pay schedule “be proposed and steps initiated to implement it for all contributing writers and bloggers,” and second, that “paid promotional material must no longer be posted alongside editorial content.”

VAS provides a comprehensive guide to galleries and museums in the western U.S. Its associated ArtScene magazine is available in over 450 galleries and museum bookstores in the greater Los Angeles area, an online version providing listings for exhibits along with art criticism. In short, VAS and ArtScene have become a prominent voice in the arts community in the Western U.S., and their stance regarding the Huffington Post is an important one for arts professionals to consider. Since Mr. Lasarow has called for his article to be circulated, I am re-publishing “On Strike from the Huffington Post” in full so as to further debate. I offer my own thoughts and criticisms in closing:

On Strike from the Huffington Post
Visual Art Source / info@visualartsource.com
ArtScene / artscene@artsenecal.com

“When we were invited to become a Huffington Post blogger last year I understood that the company paid nothing. We surveyed our writers’ reaction to assess their willingness to have their material reposted there for no additional pay. Visual Art Source, ArtScene and art ltd. (www.visualartsource.com) form an umbrella art publishing company that is actually quite large by the standards of our very specialized field. The tens of thousands of readers and online users that we boast, however, are miniscule compared to the 26 million visitors per month that the Huffington Post currently draws.

Yet we are now going on strike. For now, at least, no more content from us will appear on the Huffington Post.

And just like the corporate titans of the American Right, it would come as no surprise if Ms. Huffington, whom I am certain has a good heart and only the best intentions, were to assume the obvious position: Who needs these people anyway? They are not even employees.

Nonetheless, we shall remain on strike until these two demands are met. First, a pay schedule must be proposed and steps initiated to implement it for all contributing writers and bloggers. Second, paid promotional material must no longer be posted alongside editorial content; a press release or exhibition catalogue essay is fundamentally different from editorial content and must be either segregated and indicated as such, or not published at all.

I am also calling upon all others now contributing free content, particularly original content to the Huffington Post to also join us in this strike.

We think it is incumbent upon the many writers and bloggers to form a negotiating partnership with Huffington/AOL in order to pursue these and other important matters so as to professionalize this relationship. It is not entirely Ms Huffington’s fault that so many talented professionals have been willing to accept the company’s terms on an “in kind” basis. Surely most do so in the hopes of achieving their own fame and fortune thanks to the great exposure that Huffington Post potentially offers. Unfortunately, such participants are only complicit in a relationship that fails the ethical smell test. And those who are already nationally known figures who will never need to be concerned about pay scales, shame on you, you should know better.

It is unethical to expect trained and qualified professionals to contribute quality content for nothing. It is unethical to cannibalize the investment of other organizations who bear the cost of compensation and other overhead without payment for the usage of their content. It is extremely unethical to not merely blur but eradicate the distinction between the independent and informed voice of news and opinion and the voice of a shill.

None of this is illegal, only unethical and oh so very hypocritical, so Ms Huffington if you insist do carry on, by all means. However we are taking this action, with the full knowledge of our contributing writers and editors, in the belief that your better angels will enable you to do the right thing. We stand ready to provide whatever helpful input we can.

- Bill Lasarow
Publisher and Co-Editor

The special announcement from Visual Art Source/ArtScene is important for a number of reasons. The statement is a necessary break from the usual apolitical stance of arts publications, and it suggests a growing understanding of the intertwined relationship between art and politics, especially during this time of economic crisis, austerity budgets, and war. Bill Lasarow made further comments regarding the proposed strike in the VAS weekly newsletter of Feb. 25th., where he properly targeted the economic exploitation of writers and urged collective action:

“We have decided to call for a strike of the unpaid, non-unionized, and unemployed Huffington Post contributors. Let all writers cease to contribute for now, and until the executives at the Huffington Post negotiate a proper contract with those writers they ought to deny them the profit-generating benefits of unpaid labor.”

I fully support Mr. Lasarow’s position that writers must receive fair compensation for their works, but he does not go far enough with his critique of the Huffington Post/AOL deal. The crucial question of adequate pay for writers and bloggers aside, there is another equally critical issue at stake. Lasarow fails to address the core political question that swirls around AOL’s acquisition of the Huffington Post, that of the marginalization and destruction of independent media by the juggernaut of corporate power.

At present six giant U.S. conglomerates - General Electric, Walt Disney, News Corp., Viacom, CBS, and TimeWarner - control nearly all radio, television, print, cable, and telecom companies in America. AOL belonged to the TimeWarner media empire before spinning off on its own in 2005, nonetheless AOL has erected its own corporate fiefdom which now includes the Huffington Post. As far as its involvement in or sensitivity to art and culture, it should be noted that in 2005 AOL launched TMZ.com, the dreadful celebrity gossip and entertainment “news” website and TV series that epitomizes the type of retrograde commercial “culture” served up to the American people. Why should artists and writers form a “negotiating partnership with Huffington/AOL” or otherwise accommodate themselves to media moguls, who now more than anything, resemble the Robber Barons of the American 19th century?

The Huffington Post became a toxic mix of frivolous celebrity gossip, pop entertainment, fashion, and “lifestyle” amusements, all held together by democratic party politics and a glut of commercial advertisements - and that was before its purchase by AOL! The muddle will only grow worse as AOL implements its “Project Devil” ad placement scheme on its newly acquired acquisition. The large format “Devil” ads will take up a third of a page, and they contain modules for video, images, rotating content, and other distractions. All of this is anathema to serious journalism and social activism, let alone any type of thought-provoking art criticism.

Since its founding in 2005, the ostensibly liberal Huffington Post has been naively regarded by many contributors and readers as a counterbalance to the stranglehold corporations maintain over the U.S. media landscape. Content providers to the Huffington Post have contributed their works for free in the sincere belief they were helping to create an alternative platform for a “progressive” political vision, i.e., they believed they were part of a cause that would help bring about social change. These volunteer workers built the Huffington Post from the ground up, for Ms. Huffington to sell the project to a corporate leviathan clarifies matters, which is why writers and content providers are abandoning the Huffington Post in droves. It is problematic that Bill Lasarow mentions none of this is his call for a strike. Chris Hedges, in his article Huffington’s Plunder, put it this way:

“The argument made to defend this exploitation is that the writers had a choice. It is an argument I also heard made by the managers of sweatshops in the Dominican Republic and Mexico, the coal companies in West Virginia or Kentucky and huge poultry farms in Maine. It is the argument made by the comfortable, by those who do not know what it is to be hard up, desperate or driven by a passion to express one’s self and the world through journalism or art. It is the argument the wealthy elite, who have cemented in place an oligarchic system under which there are no real choices, use to justify their oppression.”

With progressives deserting the Huffington Post over its becoming the very thing they have been working against, it would be the worst kind of opportunism for artists and arts writers to fill the gap left by earnest reformers. Those who continue to write for the AOL/Huffington colossus will no longer be able to feign having a stance that is above politics. Instead of temporarily withholding their labor from the Huffington Post, arts professionals should do so permanently.

To defend and promote non-corporate citizen’s journalism Adbusters has initiated a campaign it calls “Huff & Puff It Down.” Essentially a boycott, the Adbusters drive hopes to “strike a blow against the corporate media and simultaneously energize the indie blogosphere.” Adbusters is encouraging support for a wide array of alternative media sources that are decidedly free of corporate intervention and manipulation.

UPDATE: On March 3, 2011, Arianna Huffington publicly responded to the Visual Art Source strike call at the 2011 PaidContent Conference held in New York City. Speaking from a podium alongside AOL’s Chairman and Chief Executive Officer Tim Armstrong, Huffington contemptuously dismissed the strike with the following words; “The idea of going on strike when no one really notices - go ahead, go on strike.” But people are noticing, and the call for a writer’s strike against the recently acquired AOL property has been duly noted by mainstream publications from the Atlantic Wire to the Los Angeles Times. Bill Lasarow, publisher and co-editor of VAS and ArtScene, was invited to publish an opinion piece in the U.K. Guardian regarding the strike, which exposes the matter to a European audience.

On March 6, 2011, VAS sent out a special announcement regarding the strike. The statement concluded with the following words: “One thing we are starting to do is gather contact information to reach out to as many current Huffington Post bloggers as possible. Please forward names and emails of anyone you know in this area; if you are a current HP contributor and/or want to join in on this, or have already, please let us know.” You may contact VAS at, info@visualartsource.com.

Protestors from Arts Against Cuts disrupt Sotheby's Contemporary Art auction in London, Feb. 15, 2011.

On February 15, 2011, as the super-wealthy gathered at Sotheby’s Contemporary Art auction in London to sweep-up even more modern art “treasures” for their fetid private collections, reality intervened to burst their illusions.

Just as Tobias Meyer, Sotheby’s worldwide head of contemporary art was taking bids on yet another oh-so-expensive Warhol silk-screen, chaos broke-out in the auction hall as a dozen art activists set off alarms, shouted, screamed, and threw counterfeit money into the air.

Stunned and impassive bidders watched as activists unfurled a red banner near the auctioneer’s podium that read, “Orgy Of The Rich,” and for all too brief a moment the self-possessed world of the oligarchs came to a screeching halt. Before Sotheby’s security had time to forcefully throw them out en masse, the protestors left the auction hall to stage a demonstration with around 100 of their compatriots in the street outside of Sotheby’s.

All of this was staged by the arts activist group, Arts Against Cuts (AAC), which had previously occupied the Tate Gallery on December 6, 2010 in opposition to the massive spending cuts in the arts now being implemented by the British government. At the demonstration outside of Sotheby’s, an AAC spokesperson offered the following statement:

“We are here to expose the orgy of the rich that the Sotheby’s auctions represent. The super rich, bankers and collectors who buy this art exist in an international bubble of their own and don’t seem at all affected by the so-called ‘austerity’ of the government. They commodify creativity and Sotheby’s helps them ferret away their goods by offering creative accounting services such as ‘obtaining conditional exemption.’

Most of these works will end up in the hands of private collectors or used as tax havens, while vital public provisions such as Education and Health Care get the shaft. This evening’s take of 30 million pounds would pay the annual salary of 1,389 new teachers, 1,765 qualified nurses or the budget of 150 libraries for a year.’

We are fighting back against the most aggressive attacks on the public sector in living memory. We are in solidarity with the other sectors fighting against cuts and openly welcome coordinated creative action to oppose the selling off of our public services, the demise of the welfare state, the speculative valuation of art and the orgy of the rich.”

The demonstration in front of Sotheby’s included comedic political performance art, where costumed artists conducted a mock auction that sold off Britain’s public services. Protestors also carried picket signs making fun of Sotheby’s auction while bringing attention to the government raising student fees, cutting education services, and privatizing libraries and the National Health Service. AAC understands that the slashing of arts funding is part and parcel of the wider attacks against Britain’s poor and working class being waged by the reactionary “Con-Dem” coalition of the Conservative and Liberal Democrat parties.

The Sotheby’s auction ended up bringing in 44.4 million pounds ($72 million), but the AAC demonstrators and their supporters made their point. The New York Times art critic Souren Melikian commented that “for the first time in British annals, a rowdy demonstration broke out on Tuesday evening inside the main room of one of the two major international auction houses.” The two auction houses Melikian refers to is of course Sotheby’s and Christie’s, which both have major branches in the United States. With President Obama announcing $1 trillion worth of austerity cuts in his 2012 budget proposal - cuts that will devastate arts funding, severely reduce or eliminate vital social programs, and freeze all non-military government spending - only one question remains, when will there be a U.S. chapter of Arts Against Cuts?

"Freedom" Mark Vallen. 2011. Digital poster published in Arabic, Spanish, and English.

FREEDOM - 8.5 X 11 inch full color poster
Download a copy of the poster here (a .PDF file at 350 dpi resolution).

Along with people all over the world, I have been profoundly inspired by the heroic Egyptian people’s struggle for democracy against the 30-year old U.S. backed dictatorship of Hosni Mubarak. As an expression of solidarity I created a digital artwork titled “Freedom,” so named because the word appears in my graphic in Arabic, Spanish, and English; my creation is dedicated to the people of Egypt, with hopes that their democratic aspirations will soon be realized.

I have published my artwork as a flyer-sized broadside meant to be distributed internationally. I invite one and all to download and print a free copy of my 8.5 x 11 inch full color artwork, which I hope will be used to advance the movement for true freedom and democracy. Please disseminate this artwork widely in the “not for profit” spirit in which it is offered.

I released my artwork on February 10, 2011, the very day Mubarak announced his refusal to resign. The hundreds of thousands of Egyptians gathered in Cairo’s Liberation Square reacted to Mubarak’s pronouncement with furious chants of “The people demand the fall of the regime!” Just prior to the dictator’s address, President Obama declared that “America will continue to do everything that we can to support an orderly and genuine transition to democracy in Egypt.” Clearly, it is time for President Obama to cut all U.S. military aid to the criminal Mubarak cabal.

My initial intention was to create my artwork as an oil painting on canvas, but this traditional way of working is laborious and slow, whereas events in Egypt have been moving at breakneck speed. I decided on producing a drawing using Photoshop with a digital drawing tablet equipped with a pressure sensitive pen. This allowed me to work quickly, and the software combination allowed me to replicate the look of actual brushes loaded with paint.

Ronald Reagan would have turned 100 on Sunday, February 6, 2011, and many U.S. citizens are celebrating this centenary from coast to coast with frenzied idolization, praise, and adulation for the “Great Communicator.”

As my beloved country undergoes another bout of historical amnesia that is every bit as debilitating as the Alzheimer’s disease our acclaimed 40th President was known to have suffered from, a comforting blanket of forgetfulness descends upon the land. As Reagan himself affirmed in 1988, “facts are stupid things,” but oh what the passage of time and a little bit of corporate propaganda can do to wipe away silly truths. Memories of Reagan supporting the rightist lunatic Generalissimos and terrorist death squads of Central America have been banished. Likewise, all recollections of his financing, training, and arming Islamic fundamentalists to fight the Soviets in Afghanistan have been forgotten; so too his support of the white minority racist regime in South Africa. All unhappy episodes from the B-actor’s mediocre career have been erased, and America is once again stuck in “Re-Ron” mode.

Lending a helping hand to relieve us of historic recall, is none other than that newly celebrated orator, President Obama. A day before his 2011 State of the Union address, Mr. Obama published an op-ed piece in USA Today that praised “the sense of confidence and optimism President Reagan never failed to communicate to the American people (….) He understood that it is always ‘Morning in America.’ That was his gift, and we remain forever grateful.” Who can resist our Nobel Laureate President’s inducement to fall into deep, unwakeable slumber? Certainly not America’s feeble liberal class, now falling all over itself in order to sound “Reaganesque.”

It is difficult to avoid being caught up in the hero-worship surrounding Ronald Reagan, and I feel compelled to deepen the national exaltation of the “The Gipper” with my own burnt offerings. But I must warn you dear reader, my version of the Reagan chronicles might seem decidedly heretical. My alternate take on his saga is here conveyed through the graphics I created during his time in office. Mind you, the images I have selected for this article are but a smattering of the anti-Reagan artworks I created during his ignoble reign, yet they help provide a more complete picture of the period, for the so-called “Teflon President” faced broad, implacable, and widespread opposition to his backward-looking and retrograde policies.

"Nuclear Cowboy" - Mark Vallen 1985. Offset flyer. 8.5 x 14 inches.

My intentionally crude Xerox photomontage, Nuclear Cowboy, was used as the central image for a flyer that announced a mass protest against President Reagan at a $1,000 dollar a plate fundraising dinner for the G.O.P. at the L.A. Century Plaza Hotel, August 22, 1985.

The text outside of the image running up the left-side of the flyer reads, “There will be a soup-line for those who cannot attend the G.O.P. dinner.”

The protest was organized and sponsored by a variety of organizations, from the Alliance For Survival and the Coalition For A Free South Africa, to Jews United For Peace & Justice and the Committee In Solidarity With The People of El Salvador (CISPES). Reagan addressed the fundraiser, and the demonstration was attended by approximately 10,000 protestors, making it one of the major rallies against the policies of Reagan to be held in Los Angeles during the 1980s.

Just two months prior to the protest, Reagan escalated his illegal and unilateral war against Nicaragua by declaring a crippling economic embargo against the Central American nation, accusing its leftist Sandinista government of backing “armed insurrection, terrorism, and subversion in neighboring countries.” Reagan declared his embargo after the U.S. Congress had rejected his request for tens of millions of dollars for the “Contra” guerrillas the White House had organized, financed, armed, and directed in military attacks against Nicaragua.

"Soldier Of Fortune" - Mark Vallen. 1985. Photomontage. 8.5 x 11 inches.

Soldier Of Fortune was my parody photomontage flyer lambasting the militaristic policies of the Reagan administration. I altered a cover of the rightwing magazine, Soldier of Fortune (an extreme rightist publication in the U.S. that openly recruited American mercenaries in the early 80s to fight in South Africa, Afghanistan, and Central America), inserting a photomontage of Reagan as the supreme mercenary commando, along with some tantalizingly jingoistic headlines. The tagline of “Shock Battalion” appearing at the bottom of the photomontage was the name of an arts collective I founded in the 1980s that primarily unleashed anonymous creative acts. The flyer was published as a color Xerox print.

“America Wins! Raiders of Grenada,” was a reference to Reagan’s 1983 military invasion of the island nation of Grenada, which was viewed by the world community as a flagrant violation of international law. The invasion was a classic example of U.S. imperialism in the Caribbean, and the assault was roundly condemned by the United Nations General Assembly, not to mention U.S. allies Canada and the United Kingdom. Reagan’s invasion of Grenada was the first major U.S. military action since the Vietnam war, and many were convinced Reagan would invade Nicaragua next - hence the headline in my parody, “Nicaragua Next: Shooting the Sandinistas, Our New National Pastime.” Also included as a headline was Reagan’s infamous “joke” about nuking the Soviet Union, “The Bombing Begins In Five Minutes.”

While campaigning for re-election in 1984, Reagan let slip his “witticism” to radio technicians while preparing for his weekly Saturday address on National Public Radio. The Commando in Chief’s quip went as follows; “My fellow Americans, I’m pleased to tell you today that I’ve signed legislation that will outlaw Russia forever. We begin bombing in five minutes.” The recorded jibe was leaked and people around the world were naturally horrified. The Soviet Red Army was actually placed on high alert after hearing of the crack-pot remark. The joke soon found its way onto flyers, posters, and protest signs around the globe. Musicians Jerry Harrison (Talking Heads) and Bootsy Collins (Parliament-Funkadelic) sampled Reagan’s sinister comment, turning it into a 1984 hit dance record titled “Five Minutes.” Harrison and Collins released their record under the name “Bonzo goes to Washington,” a reference to Reagan’s starring role in the 1951 B-movie, Bedtime for Bonzo.

"Divest Now!" - Mark Vallen. 1985. Offset flyer. 8.5 x 11 inches.

Divest Now! was a flyer I created in 1985 for the anti-apartheid student movement then active on the campus of UCLA (University of California, Los Angeles).

At the time students throughout California were engaged in an aggressive campaign to force the UC system to “divest,” i.e., to withdraw the huge financial investments made in the apartheid regime of South Africa.

The UC Regents supported apartheid by investing 30% of the UC system’s portfolio in corporations and financial institutions that conducted $1.7 billion worth of business transactions with South Africa.

Through unrelenting militant struggle the students eventually forced the UC system to divest their holdings in South Africa, helping to pave the way for the total collapse of the rotten apartheid regime.

My flyer announced an “Evening of Cultural Resistance” in celebration of the student occupation of the UCLA administration building, a takeover that demanded divestment, the release of Nelson Mandela, and an end to all U.S. military and financial support to the racist South African regime. The event took place in “Mandela City,” a tent encampment students had illegally set-up adjacent to the administration building. During that evening’s staging in front of a hundred striking students, I performed a multi-projection antiwar slide show, and singer-songwriter Carole King dropped in unannounced to lend her support and sing a few songs. The performer listed as “Hollywatts,” would in the future go on to use his real name, Roger Guenveur Smith, appearing in several productions by Director Spike Lee.

It must be noted that L.A. student opposition to UC investment in apartheid was also part of the broader national and international refusal to accept Reagan’s support of the criminal South African regime. Reagan maintained a very friendly relationship with that government, considering it an ally in his fanatical crusade against “communism.” The Reagan administration viewed Nelson Mandela’s ANC (African National Congress) as a “terrorist” organization under the influence of the Soviet Union, and Reagan himself vetoed a congressional bill to impose economic sanctions against the government of South Africa.

"We Abhor Apartheid" - Mark Vallen. 1985. Offset flyer. 8.5 x 11 inches.

We Abhor Apartheid was another street flyer I created in 1985 as a satirical barb aimed at Reagan’s policy of propping up the South African racists.

I self-published five thousand copies of this flyer, all of which were distributed throughout Los Angeles.

By depicting Reagan in the company of other well known “opponents” of racism, the mocking image made fun of Reagan’s hypocritical avowal “that apartheid is very repugnant to us.”

In a 1985 radio interview with WSB Radio of Atlanta, Georgia, Reagan said the regime in South Africa had “eliminated the segregation that we once had in our own country, the type of thing where hotels and restaurants and places of entertainment and so forth were segregated, that has all been eliminated.” That was of course a bald-faced lie. In the same interview the “Great Communicator” went on to sound off about South Africa, “I have to say that for us to believe the Soviet Union is not, in its usual style, stirring up the pot and waiting in the wings for whatever advantage they can take, we’d be very innocent, naive, if we didn’t believe that they’re there.”

"March & Rally/Marcha y Mitin - Mark Vallen. 1985. Offset poster on newsprint. 13.5 x 22 inches. Poster announcing a mass antiwar demonstration in downtown Los Angeles.

March & Rally/Marcha y Mitin, was a drawing I created for the “April 20 Coalition.” In opposition to the reactionary policies of Reagan, the national protest group organized mass demonstrations in New York City, San Francisco, and Los Angeles that took place on April 20, 1985. My commissioned pencil drawing reflected the central demands of the protest; no U.S. intervention in Central America, an end to the arms race, and stopping U.S. support for the racist regime in South Africa. My drawing was published as a bilingual pull-out poster in the L.A. Coalition’s broadsheet newspaper, of which some 10,000 copies were published. Thousands of copies of this poster were circulated in L.A., with many appearing on city walls.

The signs depicted in my drawing were accurate representations of placards and posters carried by protestors at the time, some of which I had designed myself, such as the silkscreen posters “No Más Guerra,” and “Solidaridad con el Pueblo de Guatemala.” As a historical/political time capsule, the most astonishing facet of my poster has to do with the left opposition’s call for a liberated South Africa. The African American portrayed in my drawing of course carries a sign that reads, “Free South Africa - End Racism,” but he also wears a set of buttons that read; “Free Mandela,” “Smash Apartheid,” and “Forward Ever, Backwards Never.” That the Reagan administration opposed Nelson Mandela and instead supported the racist jailers of the apartheid regime, is everything one need know about Reagan and his henchmen. Assisting the victory of South Africa’s freedom struggle was one of the U.S. left’s greatest achievements; the objective of stopping militarism and building a just society has yet to be fully realized.

"Stop The War In Central America" - Mark Vallen. 1986. Offset flyer. 8.5 x 11 inches.

Stop The War in Central America was originally a large pencil drawing I created in 1986 to express my opposition to Reagan’s policy of military intervention in Central America. The focal point in the artwork are three skeletal figures inspired by the Dia de los Muertos drawings of the great Mexican artist, José Guadalupe Posada (1852-1913), only my skeletons represent the Escuadrones de la Muerte (Squadrons of Death) unleashed by Reagan in the nations of El Salvador and Nicaragua. They are clothed in U.S. supplied military uniforms that have dollar signs as their camouflage pattern. Clutching U.S. supplied M-16 automatic rifles in their decomposing hands, they move threateningly towards the viewer. In the wake of the deathly trio one can see the graveyards of countless victims, the skyline blackened with acrid smoke and bomb-blasts. I published this unsettling image as a flyer and a poster.

The flyer announced a mass demonstration scheduled to take place in downtown Los Angeles on November 1, 1986, and 5,000 copies of my self-published flyer were distributed throughout L.A. I simultaneously printed a 22.5 x 28 inch poster of the drawing that did not include the text announcing the rally; that poster had a run of 1,000. Around 20,000 people ultimately participated in the Nov. 1 mass protest. That same month, a U.S. military cargo plane was shot down over Nicaragua killing the three U.S. mercenaries serving as its crew. One “merc,” Eugene Hasenfus, survived the crash and was captured in the jungle by the Sandinistas. The plane was on a covert U.S. operation delivering weapons to the anti-Sandinista “Contra” guerrillas, military aid that the U.S. Congress had expressly forbidden in the 1982 Boland Amendment.

"No Aid For Contra Terror" - Mark Vallen 1986. Offset flyer. 8.5 x 14 inches. Flyer based on the artist's original silkscreen print.

My silkscreen image, No Aid For Contra Terror, was also created in April of 1986. Around 200 of the 18.5 x 22.5 inch posters were printed and distributed across Los Angeles.

I reduced the artwork, combined it with text announcing a mass anti-war demonstration on the Westside of L.A. on April 5, 1986, and published five thousand 8.5 x 14 inch flyers for citywide distribution; some 5,000 people participated in the protest.

Reagan, the State Department, the Pentagon, and the CIA, insisted they had nothing to do with the arms supply to the Contras exposed by the shooting down of the cargo plane over Nicaragua - but the incident started the unraveling of what would become known as the “Iran-Contra Affair,” or “Contra-Gate.” The scandal involved the Reagan administration selling sophisticated weapons to the Islamic regime of Ayatollah Khomeini, which was subject to a U.S. arms embargo, then using the profits from the sales to fund the Nicaraguan “Contra” army, an undertaking forbidden by the U.S. Congress. Reagan denied having any knowledge concerning the secret arms deal with Iran or the illegal arming of the Contras, a denial that allowed for only one of two possibilities; Reagan willfully acted in contravention of U.S. law, or he was totally inept in his duties as President of the United States. Several members of the Reagan White House that were involved in Iran-Contra were charged and convicted of breaking the law, but their convictions were either vacated on appeal, or later pardoned by President George H.W. Bush.

"U.S. Out Of Central America" - Mark Vallen 1986. Photomontage offset flyer. 4 x 6.5 inches.

U.S. Out Of Central America was a small, 4 x 6.5 inch flyer I designed announcing an anti-war demonstration scheduled to take place on March 24, 1986 in downtown Los Angeles.

The crude “ripped and torn” aesthetic of punk was most apparent in this diminutive flyer, for which I took no credit (much of my political and punk artwork at the time was done anonymously).

In my rudimentary Xeroxed photomontage I combined a photograph of a smiling Reagan pointing at a book, with a horrific photo of Salvadorans that had been beheaded and mutilated by the U.S. backed Salvadoran military. I self-published 5,000 of these rough little broadsides, and distributed them all across L.A.

The works shown in this essay were of an activist nature, made for the street, mostly displaying a rough and ready, unrefined angry aesthetic born of urgency. These works of mine were part of an avalanche of protest art created by dissident artists during the bleak days of “Reaganism.” We are today revisited by that miserabilist political philosophy, and contemporary artists must meet its rising challenge.

"Art For Haiti" flyer. Based on the drawing "Uproot" by Mark Vallen.

Starting February 5, 2011, José Vera Fine Art & Antiques in Los Angeles will present a month long exhibition of artworks related to the people, culture, and history of Haiti.

Proceeds from the sales of these artworks will be used to provide direct material aid to the Haitian people, who are currently suffering from a long train of abuses and natural disasters - not the least of which was the January 2010 earthquake that left in its wake an estimated 1,000,000 homeless, 300,000 injured, and 316,000 dead.

I have submitted a 23 x 25 inch black and white drawing to the exhibit titled Uproot, a term used by Haitians to describe “pulling the old regime up by its roots,” - a reference to the mass uprising in Haiti that overthrew the corrupt Duvalier dictatorship in 1986. My drawing in lithographic pencil on watercolor paper has also been combined with text to serve as a flyer (shown above) and postcard announcing the exhibit (download and print a .pdf version of my 8.5 x 10 flyer). Money collected during the Art for Haiti Benefit Exhibition will go to Hope for Haiti, and All Hands Volunteers, organizations that are sending food, medicines, clothing, cholera prevention kits, and other vital supplies to the Haitian people.

The José Vera gallery will also be hosting a number of fundraising events as part of its Art for Haiti Benefit Exhibition. On Feb. 5 the gallery will hold an Opening Night Gala - with the $20 suggested door price going directly towards Haitian relief efforts. On Feb. 12 the Opening Reception for the art exhibit will be held (this is a free event but donations to Haitian relief are encouraged). On Feb. 19th a Poetry Reading Event organized by Isabel Rojas-Williams will take place - the $5 suggested admittance going towards Haitian relief. Finally, on Feb. 26 an Open Discussion Forum will be held to discuss the continuing challenges in Haiti and how the public might best aid the Haitian people. For a full schedule of exhibit hours and related events, please visit the José Vera gallery website. In the weeks to follow I will post a statement on the meaning of my drawing, and what motivated my creating it.

Photo of this writer from his "Journalism in Wonderland" post of March 12, 2010.

It is not just another year that passes, but an entire decade. And what can be said of the past ten years, aside from the fact that it has been an extraordinarily bleak period. A stolen election, 9/11, an “endless war on terror”; promises of “hope and change” morphing into predator drone attacks, escalating war, rising unemployment, and tax cuts for billionaires.

I am reminded of T.S. Eliot’s 1925 poem, The Hollow Men, where the modernist poet penned, “We are the hollow men, we are the stuffed men (….) This is the way the world ends, not with a bang but with a whimper.”

While the circumstances I mention portend what can only be described as the New Dark Ages, I am simply sketching the outlines of empire in decline; a long drawn out process that is never a pretty sight. All that notwithstanding, a few good things were accomplished in the world of art, where despite the level of folly, a semblance of sanity might be said to prevail - well, almost. The following even dozen articles offer insight into some of the noteworthy events of 2010.

The Good Soldier Schweik (Feb. 4)
My review of a rare presentation of Robert Kurka’s antiwar opera, The Good Soldier Schweik, performed on Jan. 23, 2010, at Barnum Hall in Santa Monica, California on Jan. 30, 2010.

Obama Reduces Arts Funding (Feb. 12)
This article details the cuts made to the arts by President Obama in his 2011 budget. Budgets for the National Endowment for the Arts and the National Endowment for the Humanities were slashed by Mr. Obama, all while he increased military spending.

Millard Sheets: The Early Years (Feb 24)
My review of Millard Sheets: The Early Years (1926-1944), an important exhibit at the Pasadena Museum of California Art that ran from Feb. 14 to May 30, 2010. Sheets was one of the leading California exponents of the social realist “American Scene.”

Journalism in Wonderland (March 12)
“The Los Angeles Times abandoned all pretense of being a serious newspaper guided by high journalistic standards, when on March 5, 2010 the daily ran a full color paid advertisement as its front page rather than headlines and photographs  from the news stories of the day.”

American Stories: Paintings of Everyday Life (March 27)
In this essay I review American Stories: Paintings of Everyday Life, 1765-1915, an exhibit of 103 paintings that recorded the American experience from the colonial period to the Gilded Age of the late 19th century.

Siqueiros: América Tropical Press Conference (April 3)
My coverage of the March 31, 2010 Press Conference where the city government of Los Angeles announced its commitment to the preservation of the world famous Siqueiros mural located on L.A.’s historic Olvera Street.

BP’s Oil Slick: LACMA Woes (April 27)
BP’s Deepwater Horizon oil rig exploded and sank into the Gulf of Mexico on April 26, 2010 - the beginning of the largest environmental disaster in U.S. history. This was the first article appearing on the internet in the wake of that catastrophe to bring further attention to BP funding the Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA).

Goya: Los Caprichos in Los Angeles (June 20)
My review of Goya: The Caprichos Etchings, displayed at Forest Lawn Memorial Park Museum in Glendale, California, from May until August, 2010.

Let Me Tell You About MusicaLatitudes (August 7)
My essay details the abiding impact Latin America’s “New Song” movement has had upon my work as a visual artist.

Levi Artists: Lay Down Your Brushes (August 27)
Levi Strauss & Co., one of the largest clothing manufacturers on the planet, opened an art printmaking workshop in San Francisco. This article offers a critique of the ever tightening control corporations exercise over the art world and public space.

Siqueiros: Confronting Revolution & Censorship Defied (Sept. 25)
I was a participating panelist in A Print Dialogue: Siqueiros & The Graphic Arts, an event sponsored by the Autry National Center, organized by the José Vera Gallery, and held at the Center for the Arts in Eagle Rock, California. This article reviews the event, as well as the exhibition of Siqueiros paintings at the Autry - Censorship Defied.

The Madonna of the Napalm (October 6)
“While there are obvious differences between the Vietnam and Afghan wars, the parallels are striking. This article revisits the historic posters of the 60s that excoriated President Johnson for escalating the war in Southeast Asia.”

"London Calling." Poster designed by an anonymous artist announcing the December 9, 2010, national day of student action against education cuts in the U.K. Image courtesy of counterfire.org

The May 2010 elections in the United Kingdom brought to power the Conservative-Liberal Democratic coalition government of prime minister David Cameron (former head of the Conservative Party), and deputy prime minister Nick Clegg (Liberal Democrat leader). Theirs is the first coalition government in the U.K. since the Second World War, and by all appearances it is an unmitigated disaster for the British people.

The “Con-Dem” coalition, as it has been justly labeled by critics, is implementing savage cuts to social services that will result in cuts totaling $130 billion by 2015.

The Con-Dem budget cuts are broadly attacking the public sector, from council housing, aid for the elderly, fire and police services, etc., to deep cuts in education and national arts programs.

Public resistance to the cuts is growing, but a militant refusal to accept the government’s austerity measures has so far been best expressed by U.K. students, who have been organizing teach-ins, walk-outs, marches, and other forms of protest. Con-Dem cuts to education have been especially vicious, with up to 80% of the teaching budget to be slashed and student tuition tripled to 9,000 pounds a year (during the election campaign Liberal Democrat Nick Clegg promised his party would vote against any tuition hike). Students are also opposed to the Con-Dem move to eliminate the Education Maintenance Allowance (EMA), a subsidy of £30 a week to low-income students that helps with the purchase of books, transportation, computer supplies, and other necessities in higher education.

On Nov. 10th over 52,000 students marched through central London - a protest against education cuts that culminated in the forceful occupation of Tory party headquarters. Days later, on November 24th, around 100,000 students participated in the “Carnival of Resistance” national demonstrations. Afterwards student activists announced “London Calling,” another day of national demonstrations to take place on Thursday, December 9, 2010. This time the students vow to march on the Parliament in London, where the Con-Dem coalition government will be voting on education cuts. Clare Solomon, president of the Student Union at the University of London, hopes the march will be the biggest student protest in history, saying “This is the fight of our lives and we don’t intend to lose it.”

Photograph of the Tate Modern occupied by demonstrators on Dec. 6, 2010, in opposition to cuts in arts funding. Photo courtesy of artsagainstcuts.wordpress.com

The poster announcing the London Calling student protest knowingly refers to London Calling, the apocalyptic song and title for the 1979 double album by the U.K. punk band, The Clash. Designed by the band’s official “war artist” Ray Lowry (1944-2008), the album cover featured a photo of Clash bass player Paul Simonon violently smashing his electric guitar onstage during the band’s 1979 New York performance. Lowry’s graphic design was a combative inversion of the album design for Elvis Presley’s 1956 debut album, which used a black and white photo of the crooning Presley strumming an acoustic guitar.

The song London Calling was released as a single in 1979, and its politically charged lyrics became anthemic to the international punk movement. Apparently those confrontational lyrics have become eternal; a stanza from The Clash song is quoted on the London Calling student poster - “London calling to the faraway towns, now that war is declared and battle come down.” By alluding to the contentious spirit of The Clash, U.K. students are upping the ante in their row with the Con-Dem government… but they are not alone.

Devastating cuts are being made to U.K. arts funding, with the Con-Dem coalition proposing that nearly 30 percent be slashed from the national arts budget, a move sure to ravage galleries, museums, community arts organizations, orchestras, and theaters. The Royal Shakespeare Company’s artistic director, Michael Boyd, has called the cuts “a big blow to theatres.” Actor Sir Patrick Stewart condemned the cuts, saying they will be “challenging if not life-threatening in some areas of live theatre.” Grants to museums are slated to be cut by 15 percent, and money to the Arts Council of England, which distributes funds to hundreds of arts venues - will be slashed by some 30 percent. Arts education in U.K. schools is also targeted for reduction or elimination. Creativity, Culture and Education (CCE), which has provided arts education plans to schools, has had its budget cut in half to £19 million. The aforementioned only begins  to describe the ruinous cuts - but how are U.K. artists resisting the conservative onslaught?

A number of artists have organized the “Arts Against Cuts” (AAC) web log, which is described as “an umbrella space for students, artists and cultural workers to display and align their ideas and actions against the cuts.” AAC has reported that students at Goldsmiths College and Camberwell College of Arts have both seized and occupied buildings in protest against arts cuts. AAC was also involved in a protest at the December 6, 2010 Turner prize awards at the Tate Britain.

The 2010 Turner prize winner was “sound artist” Susan Philipsz, who won for her “aural sculpture” titled Lowlands, a tape recording of Philipsz singing the 16th century Scottish lament “Lowlands Away” while standing beneath three different bridges over the Clyde river in Glasgow, Scotland. The prestigious Turner is Britain’s top arts award, and 1st place winner Philipsz received 25,000 pounds ($39,000). The Turner competition is heavily weighted in favor of postmodern conceptual works, with painters effectively barred as competitors. As usual, the “anti-anti art” Stuckist group held a protest in front of the Tate, goading Turner prize party goers with signs that read; “Abandon Art All Ye Who Enter Here.” Stuckist spokeswoman Jasmine Maddock commented to the press, “It’s not art, it’s music. They don’t give the Mercury Music Prize to a painter, they shouldn’t give the Turner Prize to a singer.”

Flyer designed by an anonymous artist from "Arts Against Cuts," celebrating the Dec. 6 protest at the Tate Modern and announcing the Dec. 9, 2010, national day of student action against education cuts in the U.K. Image courtesy of artsagainstcuts.wordpress.com

But this year the Stuckists were not the lone rabble-rousers at the gala art world affair. The Dec. 6 event was disrupted by up to 400 students and art teachers from London art colleges, who invaded the Tate gallery to protest the arts cuts. The protestors inside the Tate held an hour long teach-in against the cuts and how to resist them, then attempted to enter the Turner prize room with the intention of interrupting the televised proceedings. Tate security personnel prevented the protesters from entering the hall where the award ceremony took place, but the demonstrator’s chants of “Education should be free for all - not a product for purchase,” reverberated throughout the museum and could plainly be heard in the TV broadcast. The chanting nearly made the announcement of the Turner prize winner inaudible. To her credit, when Susan Philipsz accepted her prize she said, “I support Artists Against the Cuts.”

The protestors refused to leave the museum, and instead continued to hold a mass teach-in and life drawing class near the Tate’s entrance. A series of speakers addressed the crowd regarding the arts cuts, and others handed out flyers about the Con-Dem plan to cut arts funding. In the aftermath of the Tate debacle, Artists Against Cuts released a flyer with a headline that read, “We Shut Down the Turner Prize; Now Let’s Shut Down London.” The flyer exhorted readers to participate in the London Calling mass student demonstration, stating;

“this is the most important national day of action before parliament vote on legislation which will treble university fees. we must fight back against this DESTRUCTIVE ATTACK on the arts, humanities, and social services. come and join the arts bloc as we march to protect the intellectual health of our nation. we are not just fighting fees; we are fighting philistinism!”

The British public’s rejection of the Con-Dem cuts, and in particular their disdain for the double-crossing Nick Clegg of the Liberal Democrats, should be instructive for citizens of the United States. The Tory leader David Cameron ran his election campaign on a platform of “voting for hope, voting for optimism, voting for change.” Liberal Democrat Nick Clegg ran his campaign on promises of a “new politics.” It all has a familiar ring to it. Once in power as a ruling coalition, the “change” promised by the Con-Dem partnership became the most draconian cuts in social services since the 1920s. Now that President Obama has extended the Bush tax cuts to the wealthiest 2 percent of Americans, a betrayal of his campaign promises and a total capitulation to the billionaire class, the nature of his administration stands fully exposed.

Look to the rising masses of the U.K. for an answer, and remember the lyrics to that Clash song - “London Calling to the underworld, come out of the cupboards, you boys and girls.”

UPDATES:

In a forgone conclusion the Parliament voted on Dec. 9th to pass the tuition hikes, despite massive protests across the U.K. The 323-302 vote will raise tuition fees for university students from around $5,200 to $14,200. Students and their supporters are planning further creative protest actions against the Con-Dem austerity regime. On Dec. 10th Counterfire.org reported that “students across the country are meeting to form a National Student Assembly and to plan the next steps in escalating the campaign.”

Protestors occupy the National Gallery in London, Dec. 9, 2010. Some 200 protestors listen to a speaker as he makes a point about Manet's painting, "The Execution of Maximilian." Photo: Slade Occupation.

During the Dec. 9 protests the students behind the occupation of the Slade School of Fine Art (Slade Occupation), Arts Against Cuts, and other art activist groups and their supporters, occupied the National Gallery in London. Approximately 200 students and artists took over room 43 of the National Gallery in order to hold a teach-in regarding the Con-Dem austerity plans. The activists seized that particular room because, as John Jordan of the Laboratory of Insurrectionary Imagination (one of the groups that participated in the occupation) put it; “We chose room 43 because Manet’s Execution of Maximilian is displayed there and there is a work by Courbet down the corridor. It shows two ways of artists responding to rebellion. Manet’s painting is about political betrayal and Courbet gave up painting and applied his creativity to the Paris Commune.”

Arts Against Cuts released a flyer at the event that read; “We are here because: All our country’s art schools are under immediate threat from this education bill. We must preserve our cultural future as much as our cultural past. We are not just fighting fees and cuts - we are fighting philistinism, culture is invaluable. We act in solidarity with public sector workers and employees of the National Gallery.” Gallery staff did not interfere with the occupation, even after the National Gallery had closed. Participants in the non-violent action wrote a collective manifesto they titled The Nomadic Hive Manifesto before finally ending their protest at around 8 p.m. Slade Occupation has posted photos of the occupation teach-in, and Arts Against Cuts have also posted photos.

Sternchen Productions have uploaded a beautiful video of U.K. citizens engaged in an anti-austerity protest action that took place on Dec. 8.