politically illiterate, I

^ Kara Walker, My Complement, My Enemy, My Oppressor, My Love. Installation, the Whitney Museum of Art (2007). "When Kara Walker cut out paper silhouettes of fantasy slave narratives, with characters — black and white alike — inflicting mutual violence, she attracted censure from some black artists. At least some of those objecting had personal roots in the civil rights years and an investment in art as a vehicle for racial pride and spiritual solace."

- On Race And Art, ARTADOX.com

I don't know how to politic (yeah, I use this word as a verb, never mind how erroneous that is). I never really grew up being aware of, much less acting on, the political world and how it affects - i.e. controls - my world.

> Ayaan Hirsi Ali, author, feminist, former politician, public speaker, and champion and advocate of human rights, is one of my personal heroes. Her book, Infidel, which serves double purpose as both autobiography and political testament, ignited a white hot worldwide controversy and, for me, was a very emotionally and politically difficult read. Because of her political beliefs and outspoken views on the negative effects of dogma - particularly Islamic dogma - she has become a target of death threats and lives her life in hiding, under close 24/7 security watch.

Some of my siblings have always been politically passionate or at least have some understanding of what goes on and how it works, but not I. My oldest sister was a hardcore activist when she was college age, she's a card carrying atheist, and today she still considers herself a socialist. The youngest sister is very much against illegal immigration. "Mom and Dad came to this country and brought all of us here with them legally! Why the hell don't those illegal immigrants do the same?!" she says. My fourth oldest brother has a lot of nasty - and truthful - things to say about loudmouthed fundamentalist Christians who lobby for various legislation in order to force all Americans to live according to the demands of the Bible.

^ "Calling things by their name" | Ayaan Hirsi Ali has the balls to confront and shed an unforgiving light on what most politicians - and for that matter most of us Americans - too often stupidly and cowardly try to avoid in our liberal and 'politically correct' conversations and action. As Americans are we really that scared and uninformed that we run away from this?

I did have some exposure to politics when I was in art school in the late 80s. Or perhaps it was more like exposure to politicizing. I discovered some really good contemporary (and often controversial) artists like Jenny Holzer, Barbara Kruger, Jonathan Borofsky, Andres Serrano, and Adrian Piper. Through these artists I discovered that creative individuals are very capable of inspiring, galvanizing, and solidarizing other individuals to think, decide, and act, often times through profoundly creative works.

< Andres Serrano, Piss Christ. 1987. Cibachrome print mounted on Plexiglass.


I remember one year in school when, as part of a group exhibit, an undergrad student set up an installation using a wall-mounted lectern on which was a log asking people to write in their opinions on the proper use and display of the American flag. However, in order to access the log to write, they had to either step on, or around, an actual flag placed on the floor directly under the lectern. This ignited a seriously hot controversy at the time and ended up being on the news locally, nationally, and internationally. Patriotism or blind idolatry? Conditional respect or unchecked worship? Freedom of free speech or act of treachery (or worse, treason)?



> Untitled (rape series), 1992; various all white fabrics, red embroidered text. Visionaries AIDS Benefit Fashion Show, Cairo Nightclub, Chicago. This series of women's clothing represents the extent of my interest in the political at the time, exploring issues of cross historical treatment of women, sexual violence, chastity, purity, repression, attraction and repulsion, and conflict.

I experimented with politically and socially charged art myself, particularly after receiving my undergrad degree. But I never really pursued it with great determination and intense curiosity like those artists whose work I admired did, and I think it was because I was too self-absorbed to do so, much like so many - too many - other Americans. Today I realize that was a mistake, I should have followed my gut instincts and forged such a path to its natural directions, wherever they may lead. That would've been the true direction for me as an artist.

Today I'm very closely watching the goings on in these weeks leading up to the election on November 4. I've never been so political before in my life, never been so involved in, so passionate about, and so scared for, the direction my country is going and what it means globally.

But I still can't really articulate the fundamentals of what defines liberalism and republicanism, and all the other isms and whatnots that make up this stupefyingly complicated world of politics. I have a bit of liberalism in me, but I also passionately believe in the kind of elemental conservatism that Ayaan Hirsi Ali believes in.

I have a lot of homework and a lot of catching up to do in order to further define where I stand in the world. Thank god for Wikipedia and 'the Google'.