User's Manual to the Creative Disruption of Everyday Life

maneuver within it. Driving around the United States with a factory for carving up expec­
tations about race is just one tactic among many.

In an era shaped by the phenomenon known as globalism, the switch toward tactics has
been more warmly received outside the U.S. than in ii. The lack of visibility, and funding,
in the United States obviously contributes to the categorical myopia of interventionist
practices in U. S. museums. However, the dialogue regarding tactics, assisted in large
part through the use of the internet and global exhibitions and conventions, has provid­
ed a fluid exchange across oceans and nations. Thus, this exhibition does not limit its sur­
vey to the American national landscape, but instead follows several tendencies that high­
light this switch lo tactics.

Tactics can be thought of as a set of tools. Like a hammer, a glue gun, or a screwdriver,
You had heard about its arrival but never expected it to operate like this. Earlier in the month, they are means for building and deconslructing a given situation. Interventionist tactics
flyers had been circulated asking you to, "Get the black out. Bring three to ten items that you are informed both by art and (more importantly) by a broad range of lived visual, spatial
associate with blackness to the Black Factory on this appointed day." Now you stand there and cultural experiences.3 They are a motley assemblage of methods for bringing politi­
watching a white box truck pull up to the local YMCA and wonder what on earth this truck wants cal issues to an audience existing outside the art world's insular doors. In order to do so,
with your coffee grounds, dominos and Missy Elliot CDs. As you watch the crew get out of the they appeal lo a viewer who is confronted by an increasingly privatized and controlled
truck, you see them unload a large table adorned with blenders, scissors and pulverizes onto visual world. Humor, sleight of hand and high design are used to interrupt this confronta­
tion and bring socially imperative issues to the very feet of their audiences. In short, these
The
the sidewalk. Then suddenly, a white parachute begins to inflate from the back of the truck. To
your freakish surprise, the balloon inflates into a massive KuKluxKlan hood where you can faint­ artists are interventionists.

Black ly see the workers selling up display booths inside. Instead of the Black Panther Willie Wonka
you expected, the artist, William Pope L, begins to talk and laugh with people as they begin to If one had to make a generalization about the point of departure for the "political" art of
Factory bring their items of "blackness" for pulverization or documentation. You nervously approach and
hear Mr. Pope L say, "Well, the Black Factory is here to provide opportunity."
the 1 990s, ii would be the unanimous refusal to use representation as a tactic. The images
of violence and exploitation that so often, rightfully, move people to political action are
conspicuously absent. Instead, laboratory experiments, perplexing archives, mobile
Guile possibly, the Black Factory is the central work in the exhibition, Interventionists: Art in the homes and bags designed for shoplifting fill MASS MoCA's gallery spaces. That these
Social Sphere. The Black Factory is a truck that goes on tour, "Bringing the politics of difference things "present" as opposed to "represent" is not an accident. When the words "political
The Black factory, William Pope L.
where it is needed most." At each slop, the Black Factory engages a local community with a set art" are spoken, most people imagine a unilateral institutional critique, depressing
of tools for disrupting their expectations. People wail in line with their items of blackness only to refugee photographs, or possibly graphic statements somehow attacking the viewer for
have them transformed into some of the most unlikely, and unexpected objects: rubber duckies, ignorant complicity. The lack of these methods does not imply that such issues are less
prayer rugs, drinking water. The experience is as far away from didactic as possible, yet one can important now, but rather that the methods for communicating these issues have
not help but think that in that ambiguous experience, they received the one thing Pope L. prom­ changed. The symbolically charged image, as a tactic, no longer feels adequate as a
ises the Black Factory will provide: opportunity. communicative device.

The Interventionists: Art in the Social Sphere is both an exhibition and a limited survey of tacti­ In understanding why this is the case, it is instructive to look at the increasing growth of
cal practices in contemporary visual culture beginning in the late 1 980s. The liming of this exhi­ visual culture over the last twenty years. Could ii be that the commercial flooding of the
bition is not without a sense of urgency as the entire world feels 'unsettled' (to use a term of visual landscape has inadvertently led to the visual exhaustion of its viewers? Such piv­
globalism theorist Saskia Sassen) 1 with no small part due to the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. otal factors as the rise of the culture industry, the demise of the Soviet Union, and the
In such turbulent political times, artists operate as both a social conscience for the politics of increasing privatization of public visual and social space have dramatically transformed
today and a harbinger of the politics for tomorrow. the cultural landscape of the 1990s.

If one were to survey the surface of what represents American art over the last ten years for
traces of this urgency, one would not be too encouraged. It would appear as though "political The 90s: A Taco Revolution
art" has fallen out of fashion since artists like Barbara Kruger, Hans Haacke , Leon Golub and "A taco revolution, I am there." - Taco Bell Chihuahua dog.
Taco Bell Chihuahua dog
Jenny Holzer took center stage in the early 1 98os.2 Fashionable or not, however, political art has
continued, albeit off the art world screen, throughout the 1 990s. The most telling point of depar­ "The various analyses of "new social movements" have done a great service in insisting
ture for this "off the radar" political art would be the increasing emphasis on the tactics of inter­ on the political importance of cultural movements against narrowly economic perspectives
vention. Instead of representing politics, many political artists of the 1 990s employ the tech­ that minimize their significance. These analyses, however, are extremely limited them­
niques of art to engage real life situations. selves because, just like the perspectives they oppose, they perpetuate narrow under­
standings of the economic and the cultural. Most importantly, they fail to recognize the
Barbara Kruger Your Body is a
The term "tactics" is important when thinking about interventionist practices and this essay will profound economic power of the cultural movements, or really the increasing indistin­
Battleground
go into this term in more depth. However, for now, let us think of the term tactic as a maneuver guishibility of economic and cultural phenomena." -Antonio Negri and Michael Hardt,
within a game and for the interventionist, the game is the real world. Their projects are made to Empire.
operate within various systems of power in the real world and they use the techniques of art to
 The INTERVENTIONISTS User's Manual to the Creative Disruption of Everyday Life

"T he sixties are more than merely the homeland of hip, they are a hippy, the dragqueen, the revolutionary) were to become the poster toward an unchecked in terna tional power. Since that pivo tal even t Si tuationists, warned of the spectacle nature of la te capi talist soci­
commercial template for our times, a historical proto type for the con­ children of the 90s. in 1999, the global justice movement has tracked the movement of ety. By spectacle (a key term for the Si tuationists) Debord meant the
struction of cul tural machines that transform alienation and despair in terna tional finance: the International Monetary Fund mee ting in over tly visual and alienating aspect of la te capi tal. W hile more
into consent." - T homas Frank, Conquest of Cool. A par ticularly telling poin t occurred in December 1991 when under­ Washing ton DC (2000), World Bank/IMF meeting, Prague (2000), orthodox Marxis ts of the period were haggling over the alienation
ground band Nirvana reached number one on the pop char ts. G20 meeting in Ouebec (2000), World Economic Forum, Davos, caused by the rise of consumerism, the Situa tionists asser ted that
In 1992, Bill Clinton assumed the U. S. presidency to the rock and roll Al terna tive music had officially become mainstream. Black cul ture, Swi tzerland (2001), FTAA Summi t of the Americas, Ouebec City culture i tself was fas t becoming the ul timate commodi ty. Clo thing,
sounds of Flee twood Mac. T he baby boomers had gained ascen­ feminist cul ture, and queer culture were quick to follow. For the firs t (2001), EU Summi t, Gothenburg, Sweden (2001), GB Summi t, music, film, television and even walking were all forms of commodi­
dancy, and Clinton raised the horn of victory wi th a saxophone in his time in music history, in Oc tober 2003, none of the ar tists on the top Genoa, Italy (2001), World Economic Forum, New York Ci ty (2002), fication. T heir hysteria finds validi ty in the increasing priva tization of
hands. T he momen t was prescien t. Just three years earlier, the Berlin ten singles char ts were white. 5 T he music industry embraced all EU Summi t, Barcelona (2002), W TO, Cancun, Mexico (2003) to culture, in the form of intellectual copyright and in the shrinkage,
Wall fell and the "end of his tory," as Francis Fukuyama had so points of view and happily represented the cornucopia of American name a few. Power and resistance have obviously gone global. policing, and control of public space. If cul ture was turning into a
famously described it, was upon the world. T he 1990s were a com­ difference. commodi ty, then the Si tuationists were determined to develop me th­
plex decade known for the rise of the do t-corns, the generational W hile cul tural content was increasingly being co-op ted by the cul­ ods to confront and reverse this trend.
swi tch in power to the baby boomers, the end of the Cold War, and It may appear that we are off course and we have strayed too long tural indus try, physical urban space underwen t a parallel co-opting.

the end of revolu tions. Ye t, revolu tions were occurring. T hey were in the realm of the music, television and adver tising industry. But In the major American ci ties of New York, Los Angeles, and T heir aspira tions resul ted in the development of two key tactics that
marke ting revolutions, as the most popular marke ting campaign of there are reasons for this. T his switch in the role of cul tural produc­ Chicago, as well as internationally, artists began to feel the effects can be seen in much of the work in this exhibition. T he first is the
the 1990s, the Che Guevarian clad Taco Bell Chihuahua so glam­ tion radically affec ted the way in which cultural producers, including of globalism in their neighborhoods. Gentrification became a buzz­ detourne whic h basically is the re-arranging of popular sign-systems
orously made known. T he Uni ted States officially shifted toward an visual ar tists, saw their "con tent." "In 1915, a person could go entire word to describe the effor ts by many ci ties to remake their down­ in order to produce new meanings. For the Si tuationists, this took
"information economy" wi th the often contested bu t frequently used weeks withou t observing an ad. T he average adul t today sees some towns into invi ting hot spots for global capi tal. Ar tists found their the form of re-inser ting their own language in to the thoug hts bub­

term 'globalism' as its dancing partner. three thousand a day."

6 T he dramatic increase in popular visual own housing habits as complicit with renewal strategies for evicting bles of popular comics strips. In the comic strip here, the gentlemen
inundation coupled with the growing use of symbols of poli tical lower income families in larger me tropoli tan areas. Rosalyn is saying, ""T he very development from class society to the spectac­
Globalism and the culture industry combine to form a fertile ground action (like Che Guevarra or Bob Dylan) for commercial purposes, Deutsc he wri tes in Evictions: Art and Spatial Politics, "W hen gal­ ular organization of non-life leads the revolu tionary project to
for the growth of in terven tionist practices. T he fact that "cul ture" meant that artists needed to reconfigure their tactics to make them­ leries and ar tists, assuming the role of the proverbial 'shock troops' become visibly what i t already was essentially." T his form found new
became the primary industry of global capitalism was not lost on selves heard. How could any ar tist compe te with visual machines like of gentrification, moved into an inexpensive storefronts and apar t­ relevance in the 1990s when "cul ture jammers" and la ter magazines
many of the ar tists across the globe. T heodore Adorno, the genuine­ Nike, Gap, Starbucks, McDonalds, MTV, etc? Terms like "content ments, they aided the mechanism by driving up rents and displac­ like AdBusters began rampantly re-ar ticula ting popular adver tising
ly cynical member of the German Frankfurt School, saw this shift provider" became common as anything resistant and edgy was used ing residents."8 W hile housing increasingly fel t the brunt of expand­ to produce an underlying message such as the McDeath logo here.
early on when he castigated the consumer-oriented turn in music in to sell an underlying no t-so- hip consumerist agenda. If Che ed privatiza tion, so to did the ar ts (see Gregory Sholette's essay).
his essay, "On the Fe tish-Character in Music and the Guevarra could be turned into a marke ting-Chihuahua for Taco Bell, T he space for non-commercially driven ar t, generally the haven for T he second tactic was the derive; a shor t meandering walk deter­
Regression in Listening." He dubbed the commercialization of cul­ no left leaning political artist was safe. Counter cul ture was running supporting and legi timating poli tical art practice, rapidly decreased. mined by one's desires. T he derive was designed to resist the work
ture " the cul ture industry," a catc hall term for every thing from film to out of steam. As Brian Wallis, Chief Cura tor at the In terna tional Center for and control oriented design of Paris which had been put in place by
television to music to adver tising to fas hion to, of course, ar t. In P ho tography in New York wri tes, "In recent years, the gradual with­ Baron Haussmann in the 19 th century. T he derive would reveal hints
shor t, the cul ture industry comprises most of the service industry At the same time, globalism became a household word. W hile drawal and relocation of NEA funds have created a sor t of of what the Si tuationists called psychogeography, "T he study of the
marke ts we encounter everyday. T hrough the 1990s, the branding of arguably in terconnec tedness between nations had been increasing Darwinian ethos in the world of al ternative spaces. Many of the precise effects of geographical setting, consciously managed or not,
culture took an especially strong step forward. As Naomi Klein writes over the past century, the 1990s saw a rapid acceleration of these smaller and more fragile spaces have ceased to operate or have acting directly on the mood and behavior of the individual."11 W hile
in her insightful book, No Logo, 'The effec t, if not always the origi­ processes. T he Treaty on European Union signed in Maastricht become 'vir tual spaces.' T hose that have survived have become at first such meanderings may seem fairly leisurely and not the least
nal in tent, of advanced branding is to nudge the hosting cul ture into (1992), the crea tion of the Nor th American Free Trade Agreement larger and more like those institutions they once challenged."9 bi t political, they propose the radical idea that ways of being in
the background and make the brand the star. It is not to sponsor cul­ (1994), and the introduction of the Euro (1999) are just a few W hile political representation was being depoliticized, space, i t physical space (par ticularly in the ci ties) are poli tical acts. T he con­
ture but to be the culture."
4 no table examples. Accompanying these processes was the now seemed, was becoming radically poli ticized. T his twist is the cri tical fluence of the detourne and the derive manage to terri torialize the
familiar movement of factories to nations wi th cheaper labor pools, turn.
10 visual. T he spectacle is a terri tory. T he ci ty is a spectacle. Both tac­
T he fac t that the visual and cul tural apparatuses of the globe were the increased hybridiza tion and displacemen t of cultures and the tics, derive and detourne, take as a given their trespassing na ture.

honing in on the once rarified niche of ar tistic practice could only unexpected boom of the global ci ties like New York City, Buenos The 6os malcontents speak T hey mus t cross in to the territory of o thers, whether these are the
have dramatic affects on the terms in which artists saw themselves. Aries, Tokyo, Berlin, London to name a few. 7 T he sudden conclusion T his is no t to say that these conditions - the increasing banali ty of adver tisements of Nike or the orderly streets of Paris, to produce
of the cold war elici ted from leaders in the West a "full steam revolu tionary images coupled wi th the increasing politicization new meanings. T his sensibili ty becomes visually apparent in the
A signature element of this growth of the culture industry is the ahead" approach to neo-liberal economic models across the globe. urban space - arose out of the 1990s, but rather that they became video performances of Alex Villar. In his 2001, project Temporary
emphatic co-opting of all forms of America's counter culture. The And, in the ar t world specifically, the rise of biennials created the all the more acute during this period. It is ins tructive to look at the Occupations, Villar performs movements that resist the intended
major powers in the US economy were now standing side by side sense that ar t was being de-cen tered and this de-centered quali ty wri tings of the Situationis ts (1957-1972), an avant-garde collec tive structuring of public space. He clambers up, hops over, crawls into
with the likes of the beatniks, the ravers, the punks, the was big business. inspired by, if not past member of, Dada, CoBRA (acronym mean­ and slides past fences and walls designed to prevent one from
gangsters and the revolutionaries. T he culture industry found ing: Copenhagen, Brussels, and Amsterdam)and the International entering particular spaces in the city. T hese actions bring to light the
resonance in pro­moting the likes of Jack Kerouac and Mahatma Activists across the globe had to drama tically swi tch gears to react Movement for an lmaginist Bau haus who anticipated these very manipulative nature of the built environmen t and how strongly it is
Ghandi for the Gap and Apple Computer respectively. Thus, when to the changing political climate. T he effects of globalism were no t shifts. T he Si tuationis ts included the Danish painter Asger Jorn developed around notions of public and private.

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Stevie Nicks began singing, "Don't Stop" to a captivated audience wi thou t its opposi tional poli tical responses as the Seattle protests in (1914-1973), the Du tch urban designer Constant Nieuwenhuys (1920
with Hillary and Bill clapping in the background, we saw a clue as to November 1999 against the World Trade Organization made clear. - ), theorist Raoul Vaneigem (1934 - ), and worked wi th a slew of oth­ As we know, the poli tical upheavals of the adolescent Baby Boomer
the tenor of the next decade. We were entering a period of rebels. T he Seattle protests marked a socially critical momen t in progressive ers including the eminent philosopher Henri Lefebvre (1901 - 1991) genera tion (born be tween 1946 and 1964) were no t simply occurring
T he heroic alternative culture of the 6os (the easy rider, the poli tical history as the rallying cry was no t against a specific govern­ whom the group even tually disbanded wi th (as it eventually did wi th in the streets of Paris, bu t across

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beatnik, the lonestar, the ment, but against the in tangible and relatively abstract internation­ Constan t and Asger Jorn). In his highly informative work, Society of the globe. In the Uni ted Sta tes,
I
al finance organizations that so perfec tly represen ted the shift the Spectacle, Guy Debord, the most ou tspoken member of the foremos t "culture jammers" were
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 The INTERVENTIONISTS User's Manual to the Creative Disruption of Everyday Life

the extraordinary yippies, Abbie Hoffman and Jerry Rubin, whose real world as the game Monopoly. In this case, the interventionist An interventionist's tools/tactics are utilized in order to unhinge, (because he is so funny), "I am preaching here in the Disney Store
pranksterish antics foreground much of the interventionist work of plays on a board generally owned and operated by someone else. rework, rectify, or reclaim various social systems. Just as the today because I am a tourist myself. Like all New Yorkers I am allow­
the 1990s. One of their most enduring actions took place on August The 'tactics' are the methods used to dismantle and communicate Situationists reworked the given language of a comic strip to cri­ ing this apocalypse to take place. I know that Manhattan in fourteen
24, 1967 when Hoffman led a group to the New York Stock Exchange across these power regimes. tique the "bourgeois Marxists" and right-wing stalwarts of May '68 months will be entirely within the hellishly expanded Disney Store.
and dropped dollar bills down to the traders below. The sudden Paris, so too does an interventionist dismantle a dominant language This is Manhattan as Suburban mall. This is a fatal disease known
appearance of money flittering down from the sky caused eager For the purposes of clarity, it is helpful to look at the writings of during the current period. as Involuntary Entertainment.""7 Since the year 2000, the Reverend
traders to pile on top of each other as they all instinctually chased Michel de Certeau. De Certeau, in his book The Practice of Billy's spontaneous arrival at various global corporations has rapid­
the money. As planned, the small event spread and grew across the Everyday Life, made a useful distinction between "strategies" and This exhibition moves between various tactics of intervention in ly gained media attention and a cult following. His sermons at
mediated globe. As Jerry Rubin states, "You can't be a revolutionary "tactics." "I call strategy", he writes, "the calculation (or manipula­ order to illustrate a broad field of approaches. These approaches Starbucks have been so successful that the company developed a
today without a television set - it's as important as a gun! Every tion) of power relationships that become possible as soon as a sub­ are categorized into four sections: Reclaim the Streets, Nomads, document for its employees letting them know the proper protocol
guerilla must know how to use the terrain of culture that he is trying ject with will and power (a business, an army, a city, a scientific insti­ Ready to Wear, and the Experimental University. As a caveat, almost to deal with any spontaneous Reverend Billy appearances in their
to destroy!"12 The Yippies understood the connection between the tution) can be isolated." That is to say, a strategy is a plan made by every project in the exhibition could fit in more than one category. store.
spectacle and political action and the influence of his tactics can be those who have the power to predict and change the lived land­ Generally, the combination of a series of tactics is used to produce
seen in much of the work in the exhibition. scape. To go back to Monopoly, the player who owns Park P lace a result. This categorization is only used as a means to ease a visi­
tends to be able to control the flow of the game. On the other hand, tor's entry into a different form of art making and viewing. The urban environment has also been home to a variety of tactics of
Abbie Hoffman and Jerry Rubin understood (probably more so than a tactic "operates in isolated actions, blow by blow. It takes advan­ representation such as graffiti, wheatpaste posters, stickers, and
the Situationists who didn't have much of a sense of humor) the tage of "opportunities' and depends on them, being without any In fact, this is why the catalogue is designed like a user's manual. stencils. This Do It Yourself (DIV) aesthetics is often relegated to an
importance of mixing humor with drama in their actions. Their poli­ base where it could stockpile its winnings build up its own position, This decision harkens back to the Russian Constructivist Vladimir "outsider" art of the art world since it depends on its physical and
tics, while just as heartfelt and real as the Students for a Democratic and plan raids." "In short, the tactic is the art of the weak."14 Mayakovsky's (1893-1930) book of poems designed by El Lissitzky legal position. Or to speak plainly, these projects shine they are ille­
Society, were tempered by an understanding of how they would be Interventionists could have the wonderful opportunity to have as (1890-1941) that had tabs allowing the "user/reader" to flip to each gally placed on the walls of downtown areas. Their dependence on
interpreted on a national media front. Humor was a tactic. Humor their tag line, "the art of the weak" as their projects do in fact come poem. It also incorporates the underlying emphasis of intervention­ illegality makes the results of visual exhaustion evident since they
was a tool. Their actions were a manipulation of visual codes in a from a 'trespassing' into the territory of a dominant system. ist practice into the media of its presentation. only become visible when placed in unsanctioned areas. It as
specific time and in a specific place which produced a critical result. though we can see their position in the game. These tactics thrive
In a sense artistic techniques were a resource for manipulating the As an example, let us take a project from the exhibition: Critical Art Reclaim the Streets on the antagonisms of public space and retain an allegiance to a
situation of everyday life. The codes are re-designed whether they Ensemble with Beatriz de Costa's Free Range Grain. In Free Range "Today, steel action groups such as the lute Biance, use spectacu­ more traditional form of resistant aesthetics that goes back to
are in the streets, on a billboard, on one's body, or in a classroom. Grain, the collective has transported a GMO (genetically modified lar forms of conflict and theatrical actions designed for filming, such broadsheets, manifestos, political posters and leaflets. The God
organism) testing lab into the gallery space. With the research facil­ as climbing up a huge crane and risking one's own life to hang a Bless Graffiti Coalition has assembled over 200 of these projects
Games, Tactics and Strategies ity on-hand, they will test "organic" foods bought from stores for banner." -Encrico Ludovici, from the film Disobbedienti by Oliver that range from the more didactic work of Claude Moller to the sim­
Jerry Rubin and Abbie Hoffman thought of life as a game and they GMOs. They anticipate that many of the foods labeled "organic" Ressler and Dario Azzellini, 2002. ply beautiful work of Swoon.
played that game well. As stated earlier, their "tactics" gained are in fact chalk-full of GMOs. This revelation is not meant as an
meaning from how they were positioned with the game. How clever, expose on inaccurate packaging of "organic" foods so much as an The streets can be a forum for discussion or, in the case of the col­
witty and flagrantly media friendly were important factors in their amateur science experiment that makes visible the extent to which The streets have long represented the public sphere: a space where lective e-Xplo, a subject in itself. E-Xplo uses the bus tour, a more
success. Key to the interventionist sensibility, is the understanding of industry has inserted itself into something as basic as the food chain. all citizens can participate democratically and freely. Most political down to earth version of the Situationist derive, to transform precon­
tactics and how they gain meaning by operating within a game. artists operate with the desire to expand, test and operate in the ceived notion of the collective environment. As Rene Gabri says of
For a number of years, Critical Art Ensemble has made the field of public and so, the streets are in a sense, a second home. The sec­ their project, "We try to take familiar sites and open them up to new
When the linguistic philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein (1889-1951) biotechnology their focus. Let us think of biotechnology as a game. tion "Reclaim the Streets" (RTS) is named after the radical form of readings and possibilities. These sites range from the physical sites
stated, "What we do is to bring words back from their metaphysical It is a system of knowledge that has particular rules and advantages protest begun in London in 1991. RTS originally was just an ordinary we explore to the discursive sites we inhabit, even the 'tour' itself
to their everyday use."13 , he indicated that language is not about for those who have control over it. Critical Art Ensemble as amateur logging protest that re-arranged the rules of dissent by introducing becomes something to interrogate and question. Rather than an end
meaning, but about 'use'. A word's use came from how it was posi­ researchers are operating in a game owned by someone else. They djs, dancing, wild costumes and pleasure to radical politics in the point, the tour is really a tool for introducing questions, a familiar
tioned in a "language game." The idea that language operated as a are "intervening" in the game of biotechnology. In doing so, they are streets. Influenced in large part by the incredible boom of rave cul­ departing point for a set of overlapping journeys."
game was important to him as he understood that words operated taking the given expectations of how this protected field should work ture in England, the combination of pageantry and civil disobedi­
as maneuvers within a system of meaning. The sociologist P ierre and are rearranging them. They are trespassing into this field and as ence has since become a signature characteristic of political partic­ In their project, "xxx" for the exhibition, e-Xplo's tour bus travels a
Bourdieu (1930-2002) expanded this notion to interpret social sys­ a tactic, reworking the premises of what the science should ipation in the 1990s. Art and radical politics appeared to merge laconic journey between MASS MoCA and the Clark Art Institute.
tems (ranging from knitting clubs to art to Bedouin tribes) as games research. This is the point where the reworking of that language under the famous anarchist Emma Goldman's refrain, "If I can't The passengers listen to a GPS-triggered sound track that abstract­
and knowledge itself as maneuvers within it. To investigate this claim (whether visually, linguistically or spatially) becomes quite political. dance, I don't want to be in your revolution." 16 ly narrates the sidestreets between the two cultural institutions. As
further, he radically turned sociology onto the field of sociology When Critical Art Ensemble, present their own amateur research one travels between these areas, the soundtrack encourages a con­
itself. That is, he was interested in discovering how sociology oper­ into the field of genetically modified foods, they do so in order to This pageantry takes on a remarkable performative quality in the ser­ templative form of viewing an abandoned factory, dormant cemetery
ated as a system of maneuvers designed to enhance the partici­ challenge the role of those individuals and systems determining the mons of the Reverend Billy. A disillusioned performance artist turned and/or family's front yard. Geography becomes contested and
pants' power. Unsurprisingly, he discovered that academic papers, game of biotechnology. Their project provides a series of tools for street activist, Bill Talen dawned the disguise of a white haired, interpretable. For a brief period, the means/ends commuter inspired

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meetings, and books were more often than not used to expand the rearranging this system. However, as Gregory Sholette states, "One fanatical priest to preach his anti-consumerist gospel in the heart of form of travel is sidestepped for a reworking of the living landscape.
professor's position of power more than to actually expand the uses should be cautious about how far reaching/how available these capitalism: Disney Stores and Starbucks. Much like the Brazillian The subject of the work is the world around us and its interpretation
of sociological knowledge. This logic becomes apparent when we tools are and to what extent an art-based practice, and it still is in Augusto Boal's invisible theater, the Reverend Billy uses daily life, is up for grabs.
think of politicians that use rhetoric and spin to gain public approval. terms of venue by and large, can 're-arrange the system' no matter whether ii is a corporate chain or public sidewalk, as his stage. He

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how much it may wish to."15 delivers diabolical sermons against the globalization, consumerism At limes, cultivating public partici­ I
To bring this into an interventionist understanding, let us think of the and the privatization of daily life. To quote Reverend Billy at length pation becomes an interventionist
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 The INTERVENTIONISTS User's Manual to the Creative Disruption of Everyday Life

project in and of itself as in the work of HaHa and their Taxi Project, North Adams (2004) pro-
duced with the help of MASS MoCA. HaHa collected submissions from North Adams residents Looking through the lens of displacement and trans-nationality (or non-nationality), the abun-
and community groups relating to specific sites in their neighborhoods. The taxi then provided dance of tents in the exhibition comes into focus. The tent is mobile architecture that folds up
free rides for community members as well as displaying, with the assistance of flash animation and is easy for one person to carry. It as though life is an ongoing camping trip. The tent pro-
on led screens atop the taxi, site-specific statements. HaHa encouraged North Adams to talk vides a home for those trespassing or camping out in public space. It facilitates autonomy, and
to itself. like a bandage, points to the need for autonomy for displaced populations. Perhaps no one,
except Buckminster Fuller, has explored the possibilities of tents more than Dutch artist/design-
Nomads er Dre Wapenaar. Wapenaar has produced tents for reading newspapers, playing pianos, hang-
The Situationists may have walked the streets of Paris allowing their desire to reveal new hidden ing off trees and this exhibition, a tent for giving birth and for memorializing the dead. Tents
treasures buried in the urban environment, but today, many artists prefer to use a set of wheels. have surely come a long way.
These interventionists are nomads and they travel through space to discover and provide disso-
nant forms of existence in the urban landscape. As described earlier, William Pope L's extraor- Ready to Wear
dinary Black Factory (2004) must serve as one of the most elaborate forms of the Situationist' s Trained as a fashion designer, Lucy Orta develops conceptual and functional projects that
derive existing today. This tradition of deployed vehicles and technologies must pay homage to extend and perpetuate her socially concerned aesthetic. She produces nomadic architecture as
one if its most important artists, Krzysztof Wodiczko. well as nomadic clothing. In Orta's oeuvre, clothes become tools, and the body becomes acti-
vated. Among many of her radical fashion creations, she has developed architectural clothing
For over thirty years, Polish born Krzysztof Wodiczko has expanded the Russian Constructivist's lines that almost literalize tendencies hinted at in Wodiczko's Homeless Vehicle. Her Refuge
notion of utility and technology for the public good. As Wodiczko acknowledges himself, his Wear series (1992-1998), which she produced in response to the Gulf War, drew Orta her first
work is a mix of Situationism and Constructivism with design. "Designers must work in the world international attention. The work is at its most distilled in the early piece Habitent (1992-93): a
rather than 'about' or upon it." 18 His preferred term is "Interrogative design" which he has incor- high design tent/jacket with whistle, lantern and transport bag. Here we see yet another exam-
porated into his ongoing teaching at the Center for Advanced Visual Studies at MIT. (His essay ple, of clothing making visible and moderately assisting the situation of global refugees. Her
from 1994 is included in this catalogue). With a shift away from representation and an empha- clothes are literally spaces of refuge. 20 It is a fashion of resistance and survival.
sis on "use" in the social sphere, it should be no surprise that Krzysztof Wodiczko is one of the
interventionist's seminal figures. By emphasizing use over representation, Wodiczko's projects Clothing is not only a space of autonomy and refuge, but an industry as well. In particular, in
reveal his inherent suspicions of capital and control. The projects tend to augment individual the age of globalization clothing has been more often than not correlated with its industrial
autonomy and make visible social oppression. As a emigre from Poland, his political affinities practices in the form of sweatshops. This connects directly with the work of J. Morgan Puett who
are tempered with a suspicion of communism as well as capitalism. has produced a site-sensitive 21 installation exploring MASS MoCA's previous identity as Arnold
Print Works (1861-1942). Puett also comes out of the fashion industry as a previous owner of four
Wodiczko's Homeless Vehicle Project, 1988-89 is a critical point of departure for much interven- J. Morgan Puett and her project at MASS MoCA, The Word That
stores in New York City called
tionist political art of the 1990s. The design of the vehicle was inspired by the 1987 mandate by Means Smuggling Across Borers, 2004 references this history. Amidst a burn out ruin of bricks
Homeless Vehicle Project, New York Mayor Ed Koch declaring that all homeless people of in New York must undergo psy- and wood, a loan industry survives. Bustling away inside a small cottage, a tailor assists patrons
Krzysztof Wodiczo chiatric evaluations and if they failed, must be hospitalized. Wodiczko decided to focus on the in producing suits made from the insurance plans of the old Arnold Print Works site. The work is
issue of homelessness and used the shopping cart as a media. In conversations with homeless poetic, participatory, and strangely enough, functional. The business survives as Puett has
people, Wodiczko designed this project for multiple purposes. The Homeless Vehicle not only formed a cottage industry in the very galleries of MASS MoCA.
provided a user-friendly place for sleeping and can collection, but also provided visibility for the
issue of homelessness. Wodiczko is under no illusions that he is incapable of acting as a social Fashion also acts as camouflage. As the Center for Tactical Magic writes, "Disguise is the power
service agency. He sincerely believes this is the job of a properly functioning government. to conceal, to hide away in the shadows of another's misperception. The appropriation of sig-
However, this project brings a dynamic visibility to the issue." The oldest and most common ref- nifiers in the minds of onlookers, keyed in to their signal decoders along hacked bandwidths." 22
erence to this kind of design is the bandage. A bandage covers and treats a wound while at the Going "under cover" is not so much an entertaining game (although fun does play a part), it is
same time exposing its presence, signifying both the experience of pain and the hope of recov- a necessary tactic when trespassing onto the territory of other's. Disguise is needed to blend
ery."19 into a different game. The Center for Tactical Magic has produced The Ultimate Jacket (2003).
As a center strongly influenced by various schools of concealment and espionage (private
Since Wodiczko's Homeless Vehicle, many "mobile" projects have built upon and departed from detective, magician, ninja), they have produced a jacket as a means to augment one's ability to
Wodiczko's work. Michael Rakowitz, a student of Wodiczko's at CAVS, is the author of one such act in various situations. The jackets contains over 50 secret pockets and allows the interven-
e Word That Means
project called Parasite. Parasite, as the name implies, literally feeds off the urban environment. tionist to slip from the identity of a worker to the identity of a ninja.
ross Borers, J. Morga
Using the existing HVAC air exhausts of buildings, the homeless shelter inflates. Rakowitz pro-
duced many Parasite projects in consultation with homeless individuals and unlike Wodiczko's "Although their name contains the word 'Men,' it doesn't describe who they are, it describes
Homeless Vehicle, Parasite could be wrapped up into a small bundle and placed in one's what they do: they use any means necessary to agree their way into the fortified compounds of
pocket. commerce, ask questions, and then smuggle out the stories of their undercover escapades to
provide a public glimpse at the behind-the-scenes world of business." - From the Yes Men web-
It is not far fetched to state that many of these "mobile" projects find affinities in displaced pop- site, www.gatt.org
ParaSite, Michael Rakowitz
ulations. The mobile nature of the work points, in function, to a nomadic populace who are, to
same degree, parasites of the urban environment. Displacement is an increasingly common
politicized position. Tools for mobility find increasing prescience in a world continually forced to The art of being undercover finds its greatest example in the incredible work of the collective,
stay on the move. the Yes Men. Their project stems from the strange opportunities made available when the group
 The INTERVENTIONISTS User's Manual to the Creative Disruption of Everyday Life

took control of the website www.gatt.org. The site copied the official setting of North Adams on spaces of refuge for women. This study I could confront and debate ideas - and 'outside', on the street. duce art and those that produce politics.
site for the General Agreement of Trades and Tariffs with a few crit- took a number of forms including assistance from both an engineer- In this way I could engage with 'real life' situations and question
ical modifications. The collective has a history of producing these ing and feminist studies class at Smith College. The collective set the relationship between research and practice without making To end on a sobering tone, ii is important to emphasize the com-
sites such as their previous web creation www.gobush.org. Using out to "Uncover and map the intersections of women's material and theoretical assumptions beforehand." -Lucy Orta in conversation plete lack of consensus among interventionists. Practices among
these domains as public terrain, the collective produced their ver- affective labor in cultures of production in North Adams and Ciudad with Nicholas Bourriaud, 2001. interventionists vary greatly and these tensions should not be
sion of the positions of these various political entities. While they Juarez, Mexico." Their interest in Ciudad relates to the fact that ironed out just because they are under one roof. Nor should this
expected some people to confuse their site with the official one, they Sprague Electric, the capacitor manufacturing company that previ- "But these experiments can only take a lransformalive power in exhibition be misinterpreted as a "greatest hits" of intervention-
did not expect the visitors to actually invite them to different speak- ously existed at the MASS MoCA site for 50 years and closed in the open, evolving context of a social movement, outside the ism. This assortment of artists/activists/reading groups/designers
ing opportunities as representatives of these organizations. Yet, this 1986, moved its production there. Their installation includes a series cliques and clienteles of the artistic game." - Brian Holmes, Liars presented here point to new forms of resistance in the age of an
is what happened. of trap doors that reveal associations between the maps of North Poker 2 3 increasingly privatized and visualized cultural sphere. They are
Adams and Cuidad as well as a series of kiosks placed at local methods for resistance integrally connected to larger social move-
In October 2000, the Yes Men found themselves in the confounding places of refuge for women, including women's shelters, coffee Yet, while tactics are a useful place to begin, they are not neces- ments sweeping the planet. While it may be true that there are
situation of agreeing to speak in Salzburg, Austria on behalf of the shops and knitting clubs. This interweaving web moves between the- sarily the best place to end. While it is true that many of these extraordinary differences of opinion regarding how social change
WTO at a conference of international trade lawyers. The group oretical abstractions of globalization and distinct sites of production projects gain their resonance through a dance within the domi- can be brought about, most artists will agree that the current
wrote that unfortunately the General Director of the WTO, Michael in the local community. Through utilizing techniques of art, the col- nant systems, some of these projects prefer to think more strate- political climate is more dangerous than ever. Tactics for broad-
Moore, would be unable to attend but they would happily send a lective produces a dynamic pedagogical experience on the effects gically about changing these systems as well. As De Certeau ening social justice and public dialogue are not simply an artistic
representative, Dr. Andreas Bichlbauer. Dr. Bichlebaur arrived with a of globalization on women. defines it, tactics depend on a dominant system. For De Certeau challenge, but one placed on everyone interested in democratic
security guard and cameraman and proceeded to give an audacious tactics constituted small subversions such as lazy work ethics and participation. The artists in the show are not telling us what to do,
Powerpoint presentation on the need to streamline voting in the While subRosa might produce factual correlations, the Atlas Group meandering walks through the city. He was not particularly inter- but are providing tools for us to engage these questions. In short,
United States by selling votes on-line, and the need to ban siestas present imaginary findings. In their archival display titled The Truth ested in whether or not these tactics added up to anything actu- the interventionists provide, as William Pope L's Black Factory
as an inefficient holiday. After the talk, the cameraman claimed Dr. Will Be Known When The Last Witness Is Dead: Documents from the ally revolutionary. explicitly advertises: "opportunity".
Bichlebaur had received a pie in the face by an angry anti-WTO pro- Fakhouri File at the Atlas Group Archive, the experimental archivist
tester. Since their first foray into speaking, the Yes Men have given organization Atlas Group presents imaginary research. The Atlas However, political artists are constantly concerned with, to use
several talks with increasing absurdity as representatives of the Group investigates the contemporary landscape of Lebanon with De Certeau' s term, strategies. They want socially beneficial Nato Thompson
WTO. The gold leotard with a three-foot phallus on display here is particular focus on the history of the Lebanese Civil War (1975-1991) results. Frustrated with political irrelevance, many interventionists Assistant Curator MASS MoCA
the result of one of the Yes Men's most bizarre forays in Tampere, through the development of an imaginary archive. If the term imag- have catered their projects to fit in numerous spheres and to res-
Finland. The group, represented this lime by Hank Hardy Unruh, inary research doesn't immediately make sense there is a good rea- onate across a wide-range of audiences. They operate in many
presented a lecture to a group of Finnish college students on the son for this. The "imaginary" part of the Atlas Group research is that different social games from the "art world" to the "activist" world
inefficiency of the Civil War. Slavery, Unruh argued, would have ii is culled from their collective imaginations. That is to say, the facts to the "biotechnology" world. They understand their work means
inevitably been replaced by the much cheaper economic solution of are not necessarily "true", but then again, as the project implicitly different things to different people. With this in mind we can side-
sweatshops. At the end of his lecture, Mr. Unruh's assistant ripped asks whose perspective is? This project, like many projects in the step the argument that these practices, in and of themselves, are
off the lecturer's clothes. Underneath his suit, Mr. Unruh wore a Experimental University, problematizes truth claims. Like the title not politically effective. Their connection to a robust array of audi-
golden "Management Leisure Suit" which came equipped a large, says, the truth will be known when the last witness is dead. So what ences and methods, such as activists, publishers, or everyday
inflating phallus. At the head of the phallus, Mr. Unruh explained to then, does research look like if it doesn't particularly trust assertions people allows their specific project to come into light. The false
the astonished class, a satellite-fed monitor allowed the manager to of truth? The research is open-ended and lets the viewer make up dichotomy between activist (ambiguous) and artist (utilitarian)
control and punish workers across the globe while retaining the their own mind. In particular, when investigating the imagery and need not be such a devastating issue if we shift terms toward
pleasing comfort needed for the managerial class. history of the Middle-East, the Atlas Group is careful to not repeat interventionists operating within a network of resistance. We can
the use of neocolonial techniques. They do not assert. They do not see in the documentary Disobbedienti (2002) by Oliver Ressler
The Experimental University define. Yet, this technique does not slip into the postmodern rela- and Dario Azzellini that the tactics used by interventionists are
The range of interventionist tactics may at first appear to take a slide tivism that many rigorous scientists accuse cultural studies of. The popularly used in the growing global justice movement today. To
detour when ii comes to the "research" projects in the Experimental research is grounded in the history of the Lebanese Civil War. say there is a connection between experimental interventionist
University. Although the Experimental University is a dramatic practices and the collective protest actions today would be pul-
departure form the more literal forms of intervention as tool it also The research conducted in the Experimental University possesses an ling ii lightly. Interventionist practices do not work in isolation
points to a critical departure in thinking about what art is and how urgency that aligns ii with more traditional activism than hobbyist and, in fact, are part of a greater struggle for freedom.
art can be used. In the Experimental University (Nicholas Mirzoeff's research. Their seductive visual displays highlight a dramatically
essay goes into this in detail), the artists have decided to intervene changing political landscape whether this is the lives of women, the That is why New York-based art collective 16 Beaver has been
into a discursive space. That is to say, they are interrupting a partic- technologies of race, the biotechnology of agrobusiness, or the pol- included as both a signpost and metaphor for social connection.
ular field of study (whether this is urban studies, biotechnology, itics of Arab visual representation. These interventionists manipulate It would be difficult to consider what this constantly shifting col-
anthropology or ethnography) in order to present different critical the visual field to create a learning environment in which we, as lective does as "art", yet their importance to this type of interven-
perspectives. We can recognize these practices as "art-inspired" viewers, participate. To use the correct term, it is a form of peda- tionist practice can not be emphasized enough. 16 Beaver is sim-
because they skillfully manipulate visual and spatial codes in order gogy. It is in this regard that many museums could see the supposed ply a reading group that has met every Monday since 1999. Over
to produce criticality. As previously described, the work of Critical line between art and science blur productively together. the course of five years, they have produced projects reacting to
Art Ensemble with Beatriz de Costa makes this evident. the war and have connected various intellectuals, artists and

&-liiiiliil ►
Conclusion activists through their humble space with regular meeting limes.
In their Can You See Us Now? (2004) project at MASS MoCA, the "I came to the conclusion that I would have to be active in two This connectivity, and there are countless other examples of this,
cyber-feminist collective subRosa produced research on our local camps: both 'inside', in the museum and art centres - vitrines where is crucial in blurring the distinctions between those that just pro-