Croatian artist Sanja Ivekovic as a feminist, activist, and video pioneer will be introduced in MOMA in New York from December 18, 2011–March 26, 2012.

Part of the generation known as the Nova Umjetnička Praksa (New Art Practice), Iveković produced works of cross-cultural resonance that range from conceptual photomontages to video and performance. As the culturenet.hr informs “this exhibition brings together a historic group of single-channel videos and media installations, including Sweet Violence (1974), Personal Cuts (1982), Practice Makes a Master (1982/2009), General Alert (Soap Opera) (1995), and Rohrbach Living Memorial (2005). Among the 100 photomontages featured in the exhibition is Iveković’s celebrated series Double Life (1975–76), for which the artist juxtaposed pictures of herself culled from her private albums with commercial ads clipped from the pages of women’s magazines.” “(…)

After 1990—following the fall of the Berlin Wall, the disintegration of Yugoslavia, and the birth of a new nation—she focused on the transformation of reality from socialist to post-socialist political systems. Iveković offers a fascinating view into the official politics of power, gender roles, and the paradoxes inherent in society’s collective memory.”

via Artistic sweet violence in MOMA « Media-Via

(via The Dream of the Audience | Theresa Hak Kyung Cha)

(via Barbara T. Smith, Feed Me)

During an event organised by the San Francisco Museum of Conceptual Art in which various male artists performed wreckless and macho gestures like drinking beer and peeing into a metal tub, Smith sat nude in an intimate space inviting audience members one at a time to ‘feed’ her. The room contained an oriental rug-covered mattress, a sink, incense, body oils, shawls, books and music. The artist offered tea, wine and marijuana that she could be fed in exchange for ‘conversation and affection’. In the background, a taped loop played “Feed Me, Feed Me” over and over again.

Smith has explained that the image she projected of herself reflected both the fantasy and the reality of femininity; by presenting herself as mother, courtesan and artist she opened up the possibility that all these identities can co-exist.

I have found The One – performance 25 March 2011 

amira.h.’s performance, The One, is an act of rebellion. Raised as a Muslim, much of amira.h.’s adolescence was spent thinking about, talking about, and fighting about the issue of marriage. Now, at age twenty-seven, these same issues are still making their presence felt in her life-the contradictory life of an unmarried queer Muslim visual artist. Intrigued with instruction and ritual, as well as testing the limits of the body and how much it can endure, amira.h. presents herself, alone, as both bride and groom performing one of the rituals of marriage.

Exorcising a tradition that will not take place in her life, the solitary figure portrays a sense of mourning, pathos and loneliness, with the end result being strangely celebratory. amira.h. invites the viewer to consider and question their own assumptions and expectations concerning gender, sexuality and power whilst she stands on the dichotomous altar of her identity. Come along and celebrate The One. amira’s work questions the roles of young women in the Muslim/domestic sphere and (expectations placed on them); fat/queer/feminist politics and rituals (in marriage and religion) and transgression of these/contradiction/failure.

via art gallery adelaide - artoom5

flightbox:

Suzanne Lacy // Three Weeks in May

“In May 1977, Suzanne Lacy organized an “expanded performance” over the course of three weeks to raise awareness among Los Angeles inhabitants of the frequency of assaults on women citywide. The project opened on Mother’s Day, May 8, 1977, and included performances and installations as well as non-art events such as speeches, interviews, self-defense demonstrations, and speak-outs. On this map of Los Angeles, installed in the mall outside City Hall, Lacy stenciled the word “RAPE” in red on the approximate locations attacks reported to police during the three weeks of the project. (At the close ofThree Weeks in May, ninety rapes had been reported.) The artist later stated that “if rape was practically a household experience [she should] make its name a household word.”

(via “Back Up!”: Artist Anida Yoeu Ali - philosufi)

If you haven’t heard about Khmer Muslim artist Anida Yoeu Ali, listen up. The Cambodian-born, Chicago-raised woman is an interdisciplinary artist; she describes herself as a “performance artist, writer, and global agitator.” Ali’s work explores issues related to identity, particularly hybridity and transnationality. …

As part of her work there, she put together a multi-faceted installation called The 1700% Project—the title of which refers to the post-September 11 increase in hate crimes against people perceived to be Arab or Muslim in the US.

The 1700% Project is collaborative, and consists of a poem, a video (below), audio recording, performances, and installation….The whole project is a powerful statement against racial profiling of Muslims and the crimes of hate and violence that accompany the practice. 

More on Ali’s experiences with The 1700% Project at the link.  Additional to her performance work, Ali also keeps a personal blog Atomic Shotgun, on her move to Cambodia and creating a new media lab, Studio Revolt + contributes to anthologies and has a CD out ‘Broken Speak:I was born with two tounges’ [available via her site].

Assume Nothing: MilDred Gerestant (by kmacdonald1963)

Short film “Blending the female and male through MilDred” featuring artist MilDred Gerestant from the “Assume Nothing” Exhibition. This exhibition exploring alternative gender identity toured New Zealand Art Galleries and Museums for 18 months and features the photographs of Rebecca Swan and the films of documentary director Kirsty MacDonald.

For more information about the films please visit www.girl-on-a-bike-films.com
For more information about MilDred Gerestant, the artist formerly known as DRED
Progressive Humanitarian/Actress/Model Citizen/Healer/Activist/Haitian-American/Educator…please visit www.DredLove.com

(via Kirsten Justesen | 1973 BODY CIRCUMSTANCES)

Kirsten Justesen is one of only a handful of internationally renowned female, Danish artists. She expresses herself through a wide range of media. Sculpture, photography, video installations, events and performances, decorations, books and film.

The starting point for her work is often her own naked body. But the works are not about her. They are not self-portraits. Instead, they are about body, gender, politics, form, materials, language, time and contrast. Her body is only a tool for self expression. via SMK

(via Live birth performance artist Marni Kotak delivers healthy baby boy - Arts Post - The Washington Post)

Marni Kotak, an artist whose plans to give birth in a New York gallery as an act of performance art provoked criticism and concern, delivered a healthy baby boy Tuesday. Kotak, 36, gave birth to baby Ajax, weighing nine pounds and two ounces at 21 inches at 10:17 a.m., before an audience in a home birthing center she constructed at the Microscope Gallery. The gallery did not disclose how many people were present for the birth.

Kotak has stated that giving birth is the “highest form of art.” When she announced plans for “The Birth of Baby X,” as the performance was called, the news quickly spread online, where commenters were fast to proclaim that Kotak was “narcissistic,” that her work was “not art,” and that she was “putting the life of her child at risk”—even though she hired a midwife and a doula to oversee her labor.

Other components of the exhibit include a 10-foot-tall trophy for Baby X “for being born,” Kotak’s pregnancy test, and photo collages that depict babies with many eyes, ears and mouths.

tremblebot:

“In Love” with Patty Chang

Pretty great interview with the performance artist Patty Chang about her process. I find her work brutal and provocative. The piece where she puts eels down her shirt and the piece where she shaves her pubic hair blindfolded are particularly riveting. I also really like the image of slicing open one’s breast and scooping out melon, seeds and all. Beautiful and terrifying.

(via sexartandpolitics)

“Allah makes Muslims. Allah makes queers.” Many people live at the intersection of their Muslim and queer identities. That includes Terna Tilley-Gyado and Wazina Zondon, organizers and performers who are using art to combat rampant anti-Muslim and anti-queer bigotry and to grow the visibility, support and love for queer Muslims.

Coming Out Muslim: Radical Acts of Love is a powerful collection of multi-genre performance that showcases voices, stories and experiences of the intersections between queerness and Islam. The performance is the continuation of the Tilley-Gyado and Zondon’s joint effort to make visible public spaces for lives they love. The project began with facilitated community discussions with the goal to address Islamophobia, which fueled a gallery art show the duo developed in June, and then grew into the performance that opened Thursday.

Terna explained that the need for increased visibility was evident. “A lot of people have said, ‘You can be gay and Muslim?’ I know a good number of people who felt that they had to choose [between queerness and Islam], and I hope this performance and process shows the possibility that they don’t have to—that they can be both.”

via Today’s Love: Taking the Stage for Queer Muslims - COLORLINES

From an October 2011 performance

via Carolina Mayorga

‘The Miraculous Artist’ Carolina Mayorga, Interactive performance, 2011.

Artist statement: Social issues related to my culture have always been the theme of my art: My culture related to Catholic rituals, the political situation of my native Colombia, issues of migration as a response to my bi-cultural experience of living in Colombia and the United States, and most recently, my perspective on the current global war that has shaped the beginning of the 21st Century.

Many of these themes have resulted in sculpture/installation projects involving audience participation and the changing qualities of nature. I am also interested in sculpture that involves time as part of the concept and leaves no sign of existence after completion of the process.

utnereader:

(via Designboom)

“The Mending Project’ by Chinese-born artist Beili Liu is a performance art and installation project that consists of hundreds of Chinese scissors suspended from the ceiling in a shimmery cloud. Put on at the Women and Their Work gallery in Austin, Texas, USA earlier this year, the piece involved the artist sitting in front of a small black table, hand-mending patches of fabric together which visitors are encouraged to cut themselves near the entrance. As the performance continues,
the piece grows as one continuous cloth and lays spread on the floor. 

notyourkinddear:

leidis:

Heather Holliday! Professional Freak! Sword Swallower! 

Personal hero since 2004 when I saw her perform at the Coney Island Sideshow (think that was her first year there too). 

OMG……………… da Hotness…

(via so-treu)

My friend and college classmate, Sydnie L. Mosley, has initiated an exciting project that has the potential to have a powerful impact on women. The Window Sex Project addresses and tackles the every day practice in which women are “window shopped,” that is, forced to bear unsolicited verbal harassment from men while walking down the street.

Through community workshops and choreographed performance, The Window Sex Project will give voice to these concerns and restore agency to women by equipping them to manage street harassment, celebrating their bodies and creating a public artwork, specifically a dance performance which takes place in an art gallery. In addition, the project encourages women to share their stories about street harassment.

The performance component of The Window Sex Project investigates how a woman’s sexuality is perceived based on the physical attributes of skin color and body type. The work places six women of varying races and body types on pedestals in an art gallery setting, forcing audiences to contend with the objectification of the female body in a contemporary society. The project aims to equally celebrate all the bodies illustrating how each woman’s sexuality is unique to her rather than outside perceptions. This work is grounded in personal experiences, feminist theory, and a collective need to take action.

The community workshops aim to address and tackle street harassment in Harlem in both a practical and creative manner. The workshops rooted in movement, discussion and healthy eating will investigate the way in which the bodies of women in Harlem are perceived.

Amazing sounding project done earlier this year. Blog of the process and videos at http://www.windowsexproject.com/