M16 Art Project

With its M16 Art Project, the “peace activist” organization Peace One Day, asked 14 contemporary artists “to use decommissioned M16 assault rifles to produce artwork, thereby continuing the story of taking objects of war and using them in support of peace.”

The M16 Art Project is the companion exhibition to the earlier AKA Peace exhibit mounted by Peace One Day in 2012; both shows were curated by postmodernist Jake Chapman of Chapman Brothers infamy. I wrote an extensive critique of AKA Peace that I titled, AKA Peace: Off Target. That article ended with the following:

“AKA Peace was not an antiwar exhibit; it ignored history and kept clear of any critique of ultra-nationalism, militarism, or imperialism. It did not critically assess the economic and political reasons that give rise to war. It had nothing to say about fundamentalist religious extremism, nor did it even present an elemental pacifist stance regarding warfare. The exhibit essentially depoliticized war, the most political of all issues.

It was not a loathing of state violence that served as the foundational view of the show so much as it was an irrational and morbid fear of firearms. AKA Peace was one of the most simplistic responses I have seen from artists reacting to real world political issues.”

I will not be writing a review or critique of the M16 Art Project; to do otherwise would be redundant. Everything that might be expressed about Peace One Day, Jake Chapman, and the insipid politics behind the project, has already received more than enough attention in my AKA Peace: Off Target article of 2012.

Still, some things just bear repeating. It is stupefying that the transgressive and intentionally hideous works of Chapman, bereft of even a smattering of beauty or humanist compassion, can be showcased by Peace One Day as examples of art created for the uplift and betterment of humanity.

But Peace One Day is itself a paradigm of contemporary “progressive” thought and action; it decorates itself with lofty rhetoric but offers no cohesive analysis, theory, or political solution. At best, it proffers charitable deeds, but ignores the necessity of deep structural change. Its platitudes are understood by some to be “antiwar,” but as the rest of this article shall illustrate, the organization’s bromides simply mask its deep hypocrisy.

Not surprisingly, Peace One Day solicits corporate sponsorship, asserting that “Corporations have the power to generate unparalleled levels of awareness all over the world.” Yes… just as they have been doing lo these many years. A corporate sponsor that Peace One Day once listed euphemistically on its website as a member of its “corporate coalition” is McKinsey and Co, Inc., a major US consulting firm that advises international governments, businesses, and institutions (Update: In July 2016 Peace One Day removed any mention of Mckinsey and Co, Inc. from its website, but a LinkedIn page for Peace One Day documents the relationship between the two).

So what does Peace One Day have to do with this consigliere for global ruling elites and the Fortune 500 billionaire class? Therein lies the rub.

In 2005 it was revealed by the Guardian that in June of that year the Labour Party Prime Minister Tony Blair hired David Bennett, a former senior partner at McKinsey, to head Blair’s Policy Directorate and Strategy Unit. Bennett also served as Blair’s Chief Policy Advisor. At the time British soldiers had been occupying Iraq since Blair misled the UK into war on Iraq in 2003. In Nov. 2005 the London Financial Times revealed that the Blair administration had commissioned a report from McKinsey that paved the way for “a shake-up at the heart of government.” The same article also stated that the UK Ministry of Defense handed the “consultancy firm £40m worth of contracts since 2001” (for Americans, that is over $64 million Yankee dollars).

Large sections of the British public regard Tony Blair with open contempt for closely supporting US President George W. Bush and involving the British armed forces in the invasions of Afghanistan (2001) and Iraq (2003). Many even call Blair a war criminal, some Americans, such as yours truly, concur. The question is, why does Peace One Day accept sponsorship from McKinsey and Co, Inc., a global corporation with clear links, not just to Blair, but to the UK Ministry of Defense?

Though McKinsey and Co, Inc. does not list their clients, their website makes clear what they do when not sponsoring Peace One Day. In the company’s own statement, “We serve more than 75 percent of the top 25 aerospace and defense companies in the world, and support numerous defense agencies in both mature and emerging markets.” The company also helps “defense organizations realize their strategic visions and meet mission-critical goals.”

What’s more, the McKinsey website offers the company’s Special Issue reports. Its Spring 2010 McKinsey on Defense report (since removed) presented articles with titles like; An expert view on defense procurement, Improving US equipment acquisition, and Stabilizing Iraq (!) In part, the document’s introduction reads: “(….) the world remains a dangerous place. Defense forces must still be capable of deploying and sustaining ‘boots on the ground.’ Weapons must be maintained and upgraded. What, then, is to be done? In this edition of McKinsey on Government, we, along with some eminent military thinkers and practitioners, look at a range of challenges facing militaries that must do more things – some of them relatively new things – with less.”

When the skilled Orwellian writers at McKinsey and Co, Inc., aver that militaries must do “relatively new things – with less,” what exactly are they suggesting? Cyber warfare departments? Armed drone warfare? Since the “peace activists” at Peace One Day have partnered with McKinsey to help bring about a world without war, they might want to ask.

The Spring 2013 McKinsey on Defense report covers the company’s view on government military spending in a time of austerity. Contained in the 2013 report is an article titled, Cut fat not muscle: Preserving combat power when defense budgets are falling. The organizers at Peace One Day might have read it, but are hoping you have not. The report states that McKinsey “presents a potential solution through which governments can increase defense productivity to reduce costs without cutting capability.” One must assume that the preservation of military “capability” includes the acquisition of M16 rifles and other weapons systems large and small.

Apart from McKinsey’s depredations in the UK, the firm helps “shape strategy and strengthen operations for players in major industries” all across the globe. The infamous Enron scandal comes to mind. Enron became synonymous with corporate crime in 2001 when the US energy and commodities-trading giant was caught running the largest accounting fraud in history. In a March, 2002 article, the Guardian called McKinsey “The firm that built the house of Enron.” Jeffrey Skilling was a McKinsey consultant that worked for Enron starting in 1987 and by 1990 he became chairman and chief executive officer of Enron. In May, 2006, Enron founder Kenneth Lay along with Jeffery Skilling, were found guilty of fraud and conspiracy; Skilling was sentenced to 24-years in a federal prison for his financial crimes.

McKinsey is a paid consultant for governments from the reactionary kingdoms of the Middle East, to the nations of Latin America, Africa, and Asia. You may be rooting for the “pro-democracy” protestors in Hong Kong, China, but McKinsey and Co, Inc. are placing their bets on Beijing. As an example of their service to humanity and why Peace One Day would value such a partner, let us briefly examine the machinations of McKinsey in India.

In A bright future for India’s defense industry?, an article from the previously mentioned 2013 McKinsey on Defense report, the firm suggested what the Indian government “can do to seize the moment” in expanding “India’s defense sector.” It must be assumed that McKinsey is currently assisting the Indian government in doing just that.

The maneuverings of McKinsey and Co, Inc. are obvious enough, and it is easy to grasp that their partnership with Peace One Day is window dressing meant to present the firm in a benevolent light, but what does Peace One Day get out of the relationship? That question would be based on the naive assumption that the so-called peace activists of the organization were not simply enthusiastic frontmen for McKinsey and Co, Inc., as well as other powerful business and governmental interests.

The M16 Art Project first came to my attention when I read a BBC report that the London home of English actors Samantha “Sam” Taylor-Johnson and Aaron Taylor-Johnson had been raided by up to a dozen armed police. A “concerned passer-by” had spied a “machine gun” through the window of the couple’s home, and dutifully informed the local authorities. Moments later the police entered the residence of Sam (director of Fifty Shades of Grey) and Aaron (co-star in the 2014 Godzilla) to search for the weapon, possession of which would have violated England’s stringent gun laws.

The couple and their children were not at home during the armed search of their abode. The police found the weapon and confirmed that it was a decommissioned M16 rifle given to the Taylor-Johnsons by Peace Day One, the rifle to be used in the group’s upcoming antigun M16 Art Project. No arrests were made. Such a scenario would make for an interesting narrative in an artwork, or perhaps a lively performance art piece… but that apparently is not what Peace One Day had in mind.

The M16 Art Project will be exhibited at London’s Institute of Contemporary Arts from Oct. 13 to Oct. 19, 2014, with an auction of the artworks taking place at Bonham’s on Oct. 17, 2014.