First in the series, “The Art of Resistance”
In the wake of the recent presidential election, many people are casting about for the best ways to respond. We face an incoming president who promises mass deportations of immigrants, removal of environmental protections and a rollback of LGBTQ rights among other drastic policy shifts. Author Toni Morrison said on social media, “In times of dread, artists must never remain silent. This is precisely the time when artists go to work.” These words are deeply resonant.
This quote immediately brings to mind Pablo Picasso’s famous painting, Guernica, widely regarded as one of the strongest anti-war pieces of art. It was Picasso’s response to the 1937 bombing of Guernica, Spain by an alliance of Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy during the Spanish Civil War. Now part of the public domain of art, Guernica stands as a model for how artists respond to great injustice.
ARTnews, the largest and oldest arts publication in the world, ran a piece immediately after the election with a quote by author Rebecca Solnit that called for resistance. “They want you to feel powerless and surrender and let them trample everything and you are not going to let them. You are not giving up, and neither am I. The fact that we cannot save everything does not mean we cannot save anything and everything we can save is worth saving.”
Knowing that art is a powerful language, OLY ARTS spoke with some local Olympia area artists on how they feel compelled to respond to the recent election. First, Olympia-area mosaic artist Jennifer Kuhns. Kuhns had collaborated with Florida-based artist Cherie Bosela to create a literal heart-felt response to the Orlando Massacre at the Pulse, where 49 people were slaughtered in an anti-LGBTQ hate crime in 2016. Together, they envisioned a mosaic mural that was installed on the exterior wall of a building in the Mills 50 district in Orlando. Their vision was brought to life through a series of community workshops and global outreach where people of all ages made and sent heart mosaics that were incorporated into a large-format mosaic mural.
Kuhns took a longer view of the question, reaching back into the long history of arts as a cultural record and said, “As someone with a strong interest in cultural anthropology, I visit a lot of ancient sites, ruins, and museums around the world, and I’ve been struck by the fact that so much of what we understand about history is informed by artists. It’s the artists in society who are telling the story of our culture, through designs and crafts, from pottery and jewelry to frescoes and relief carvings. We understand how people lived, worshipped, played, what was valued, all because we can see the stories told through art. Artists can challenge dominant paradigms and power structures, and can offer new perspectives. However, creating beauty and joy in the midst of strife is a radical act in and of itself.”
Natalie Coblenz is a local artist and the genius behind our local Pride events. Having started out as political rallies and marches, Pride festivals and parades are renowned for having a call-and-response dynamic in relation to current events in general and civil rights issues in particular. Coblenz said, “For me as a triple threat — BIPOC, non-binary and queer, I feel compelled to listen to my community and find ways to lift them up when people try to put us down. After years of hosting events, I know the stage offers a place to heal, to educate and to empower folks. At times like these, I find ways to bring that alive through graphic arts, DJ’s and drag performers.”
Marilyn Frasca, a remarkable artist and retired Evergreen professor whose teaching launched a thousand artists, took a more philosophic view of the question. Frasca said, “Yes, I know that quote from Toni Morrison and I’ve thought of it often lately. Here’s a quote that I’ve pondered by Rumi, ‘Today, like every other day, we wake up empty and frightened. Don’t open the door to the study and begin reading. Take down a musical instrument. Let the beauty we love be what we do. There are a hundred ways to kneel and kiss the ground’”.
Clearly, these questions are not settled and the future is still unknown. As the incoming president’s campaign promises unfold into actual policy, there will be much discussion, both words and in artworks. The question of how artists respond will remain urgent. I hope to continue this dialogue in a regular column titled, “The Art of Resistance” that will feature the work of local artists.