Artists as Activists: The Simulation of Politics and its Value

Authors

  • Philipp Kleinmichel

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.25038/am.v0i7.84

Keywords:

art activism, simulation, symbolic economy, aesthetization, Trotsky, Breton, Occupy

Abstract

Today we may witness the emergence of various forms of political activism as art. Based on a necessary distinction between political activism and political activism as art, the article highlights the symbolic economy that stabilizes the relation and structural difference between art activism and political activism. Insisting on the fact that political activism as art must be measured not only by its impact on the psycho-political atmosphere of our time, the author portends that the meaning of art activism appears in regard to its innovative function within the contemporary art world, which is the musealization and historization of political activism.

Author Biography

Philipp Kleinmichel

Hochschule für Theater und Musik, Leipzig; Hochschule für Gestaltung, Karlsruhe
Germany

References

Baudrillard, Jean. “The Precission of Simulacra.” Simulacra and Simulation. Michigan: University of Michigan Press, 1994. DOI: https://doi.org/10.3998/mpub.9904

Breton, André, and Leo Trotsky. “Manifesto for an Independent Revolutionary Art.” https://www.marxists.org/ subject/art/lit_crit/works/rivera/manifesto.htm

Foucault, Michel. “Society Must Be Defended”: Lectures at the Collège de France, 1975–1976. New York: Picador, 2003.

Groys, Boris. “On Art Activism.” E-Flux Journal, June 2014. http://www.e-flux.com/journal/on-art-activism

Kleinmichel, Philipp. Im Namen der Kunst: Eine Genealogie der politischen Ästhetik. Vienna: Passagen, 2014.

Marchart, Oliver. “The Groundless Ground of Identity: Nonidentitarian Movements and Democracy.” In W(h)ither Identity? Locating the Self and Transforming the Social, edited by Veronika Zink, Johanna Fernández, and Dannae Gallo González. Trier: WVT, 2015.

Marchart, Oliver. Die Prekarisierungsgesellschaft I: Prekäre Proteste. Politik und Ökonomie im Zeichen der Prekarisierung. Bielefeld: Transcript, 2013. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1515/transcript.9783839421925

Rancière, Jacques. Disagreement: Politics and Philosophy. Minneapolis: Minnesota University Press, 2004.

Rancière, Jacques. The Politics of Aesthetics. London, New Delhi, New York, Sydney: Bloomsbury Publishing, A&C Black, 2006.

Rebentisch, Juliane. “Über Die Allianz von Anti- und Erfahrungsästhetik.” Texte Zur Kunst 81 (2011): 112–115.

Schillinger, Jakob. “7th Berlin Biennale”, Artforum.com. https://artforum.com/inprint/issue=201206&id=31092

Sloterdijk, Peter. Rage and Time: A Psychopolitical Investigation. New York: Columbia University Press, 2013.

After the end of Soviet hegemony and the fall of socialist regimes in Central and Southeast Europe, the consideration of the relationship between art and politics seems urgent. The experience of more than two decades of political and structural changes toward the development of institutions of global capital also contributes to this urgency. The debate over the (political) nature of art becomes necessary, taking into account that this question has been superseded by a marketplace wherein all designations and forms of Art are available. It shows (itself) to be the best vehicle for manipulation and instrumentalization towards the current doxa that ‘everything is possible’. Moreover, the issue of the political aspect of art has been complicated by the dominant intellectual opinion and denunciations that all forms of utopian and social dimensions of art, as in the case of revolutionary and emancipatory perspectives of the avant-gardes, are responsible for the horrors of totalitarianism and terrorism. The aim of this issue therefore is to address the question of how to constitute and affirm an active Art today without slipping into essentialism. Focus Issue Editor: Bojana Matejić

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Published

15.04.2015

How to Cite

Kleinmichel, P. (2015). Artists as Activists: The Simulation of Politics and its Value. AM Journal of Art and Media Studies, (7), 13–20. https://doi.org/10.25038/am.v0i7.84

Issue

No. 7 (2015): Issue No. 7, April 2015 - Topic of Issue: Art and Politics: Agency, Autonomy, Emancipation

Section

Articles

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AM Journal of Art and Media Studies ISSN 2217-9666 - printed, ISSN 2406-1654 - online, UDK 7.01:316.774

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