Political Art
& the struggle to be creative in the modern world
by Robert Allen
Allegory and symbolism play a huge part in how we see our
world. When Roberto Benigni wrote his Oscar winning film La
Vita è Bella (Life is Beautiful), taking the title from
Leon Troksky, he literally inverted the horrors of the
holocaust to create a story of love and joy for life. He
took very seriously the words of the film's title song:
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Smile without a reason why
Love as if you were a child
Smile no matter what they tell you,
don't listen to a word they tell you
'cause life is beautiful that way.
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The Nazis played classical music to drown out the screams
of their victims. Benigni turned this into a symbolic
retort by broadcasting Offenbach's The Tales of Hoffmann:
Barcarolle in a gesture designed to engender hope.
Benigni was severely criticised for this film. It is a film
that is not easy to understand. This is not because of its
comical approach to the holocaust. It is because Benigni
introduces the audience to an allegorical journey that
embraces the political art of Dante Alighieri, Arthur
Schopenhauer and Leon Troksky among many other artistic
references. The film is a rich tapestry of human culture
and only those who understand what art can achieve are able
to see what lies behind the obvious.
Does this mean that Roberto Benigni is a radical? Or simply
an artist who understands the role of allegory, comedy,
music and art in a world where the corporate-controlled
multi-media, in the words of Mayo writer John Healy,
"sledge-hammers its cultural values" into the minds of our
young?
John Zerzan, the Eugene-based anarchist whose writings are
said to have inspired the anti-World Trade Organisation
protests in Seattle in 1999, would probably say he isn't
either because he uses symbolic culture, one of the
harbingers of civilisation, which many in the No Global
movement apparently want to destroy. If Benigni felt a need
to debate such an argument he might counter using Zerzan's
own words:
"The magnitude of symbolization testifies to how
much has been repressed; buried, but possibly still
recoverable."
This is not a new argument. Understanding what the artist
means, when the artist's work is not easy to understand -
because it has to be expressed using allegory or symbolism,
is why we need art to interpret the world. Art without
emotional or political input is art for art's sake. It
reduces and debases the role of the imagination.
In his 1926 novel Steppenwolf, Hermann Hesse discussed the
soul of the artist. When asked to summarise the meaning of
his book, Hesse said:
"The story of the Steppenwolf
pictures a disease and crisis - but not one leading to
death and destruction, on the contrary: to healing."
Can art heal? Many artists would argue that it can, if the
art under scrutiny is art that moves the senses. So what
are the implications for creative artists tackling themes
that are not part of the mainstream? Does art have a future
in a world where all media is controlled by giant
corporations, where the voices and actions of creative and
imaginative artists are oppressed because their work cannot
be homogenised into a commercialised entity that supports
the dominant world view? Has the expression of creative art
become another aspect of the social struggle against
globalisation? Why is it that the art we see around us is
not a reflection of what is really happening in the world?
Is it because the images, stories, songs and artistry of
our immediate environment are the product of the corporate
world, the commercial world, the world of profit and gain?
We do not live in a world of warp-drive spaceships but we
do live in a world where disaffected teenagers mow down
their schoolmates. We do not live in a world that shows the
bloody aftermath of a smart bomb strike but we do live in a
world that shows a Hollywood hero escape unscathed from a
cartoon-like hail of hi-tech bullets. We do not live in the
cinematic world of constant competitive conflict but we do
live in a world where mutual aid defines the lives of
millions.
The reality of the real world is apparently boring by
comparison with the images we see everyday from multi-media
yet real life is much tougher and much harder to endure
than any contrived media fest - and despite this, one
element of human life shines through, our ability to be
creative. All over the world imaginative communities are
building new futures through mutual aid, co-operation,
sharing, self-respect, dignity and especially through their
art - in the face of oppression and injustice.
The secret to the success of the Zapatista revolution in
the Chiapas region in Mexico is the way they use their
imaginations. In much the same way that it was language and
our ability to imagine that created civilisation, the
Zapatistas changed the symbols that defined their lives.
"The Zapatistas have tried to move away from what they see
as the tired language of revolution and to develop a new
language of revolt," says John Holloway, the Dublin-born
lecturer in sociology at Puebla University in Mexico, who
has studied the revolution.
"The role of imagination,
storytelling and so on is very important: not so much as a
way of getting a serious message across in popular form,
but above all because the language of revolt is basically
different from the language of domination. Domination is
serious and boring, revolt has to be fun."
The role of the artist - the storyteller, the poet, the
balladeer, the musician, the puppeteer, the sculptor - has
always been crucial during conflict against oppression. In
our automised, electronic age we seem to have forgotten the
inspiration singers and songwriters, for example, give us,
making it easier to get up in the morning and continue the
struggle.
A primary reason for this is that we have become polarised
into fiercely competing and mutually intolerant ideologies.
This has not led to communication and understanding, it has
instead resulted in a paralysing gridlock. Creative people
provide the means to break that gridlock. We need creative
people to present us with new visions for living, with new
visions for the future, with alternatives to the models
that have repeatedly lead to failure and misery.
We live in a world of competing lies. The old virtues of
honour and honesty have tragically been lost and forgotten.
Whenever we hear a statement coming from a politician, a
corporate head, or a news reporter, we can have good faith
that what they are saying is very likely to be partially or
completely false. The absence of honour and honesty leads
to the decay and collapse of nations, communities,
families, and individual lives. So, who will tell the
truth?
Throughout human history, creative people have been
truth-tellers. They have played important roles in
countless dramas of social change. Today, it is no
different. Here in Ireland, where we are clinging to our
reputation as a land of hedgerow storytellers and earthly
poets, artists are still working hard to tell the truth, to
inspire the people.
Sean Tyrrell, a Clare balladeer who collects traditional
ballads long forgotten, was one of the musicians at a
concert in 1990 called 'Fool's Gold'. The purpose of this
concert was to raise money to fund opposition to the
creation of a gold mine at Croagh Patrick. Poets Padraig
Stevens and Siobhan O'Higgins were inspired to add a few
new lyrics to the original version of Rising of the Moon.
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As we wander through the Universe, on this dark winter's night
the children they're all dancing and the stars are shining bright
One more word must now be spoken out, or sung to an old tune
Let's be friends this New Year coming at the Rising of the Moon
So we gaze unto the stars that shine, with wonder in our eyes
Will we just destroy the planet or is peace to be the prize?
'Cos the wall of fighting nations dims the beauty of the tune
Let's all dance the dance of Freedom, at the Rising of the Moon
At the Rising of the Moon, at the Rising of the Moon
Let's be friends this New Year coming at the Rising of the Moon
May the wisdom of the Ancients with their messages and signs
Come to shine on our tomorrows, with the magic of their time
Like a start that shone on the wise men, like the dawn that's coming soon
It's the truth that guides us onward at the Rising of the Moon
We can live within God's garden if we tend her with our care
We can understand the meaning and the motives of the fair
Tho' we stumble thru the darkness trying far too much too soon
Let's all stand up and be counted at the Rising of the Moon
At the Rising of the Moon, at the Rising of the Moon
Let's be friends this New Year
coming at the Rising of the Moon
In 1998 Kevin Hayes, inspired by the tree planting walks of
Longford man John Crossan, produced an album called 'Trees
Are Life'. Éanna Dowling, who was one of the campaigners
involved in the Glen of the Downs campaign, contributed a
song called I'll Plant A Seed.
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It's not the end of the world
when a starving baby cries
It's not the end of the world
when the smog obscures the sky
It's not the end of the world
when your loved ones say goodbye
It's not the end of the world when
you can't find paradise
For every living soul, dancing beyond control
For every blossom that must fall
For every ancient wood, painted in chainsaw blood
For every tree that is cut down
I'll plant a seed and then another
I'll plant a seed and then another
I'll plant a seed and then another
I'll plant a seed and then another, another
It's not the end of the world when
the road gets extra lanes
It's not the end of the world when
your morning's filled with pain
It's not the end of the world when
the world seems set on gain
It's not the end of the world if
you don't know if you're sane
For every ancient wood, painted in chainsaw blood
For every tree that is cut down
For every living soul, dancing beyond control
For every tear drop that must fall
I'll plant a seed and then another
I'll plant a seed and then another
I'll plant a seed and then another
I'll plant a seed and then another, another
Jim Page is a Seattle-based singer-songwriter well known to
Irish audiences. His song, Hiroshima, Nagasaki, Russian
Roulette, was made famous by Moving Hearts during the
1980s. By the end of the 20th century this street singer
was still celebrating the protest movement's effect on
culture and politics, with his masterly summation of Seattle in
November 1999 in his ballad Didn't We.
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November 30th, '99
history walkin' on a tightrope line
big money pullin' on invisible strings
gettin' into everything
so deep, it's hard to believe
it's in the food and the water and the air you breath
and the chemistry, the bio-tech
the banker with the bottomless check
the corporations and the CEO's
and the bottom line is the profit grows
the money talks, you don't talk back
they don't like it when you act like that
but didn't we
shut it down
didn't we
November 30th, '99
it was a Tuesday mornin' when we drew the line
it was the WTO comin' to town
and we swore we're gonna shut it down
and they stood there with their big police
they had the National Guard out to keep the peace
with the guns and the clubs and the chemical gas
but still we would not let them pass
and they raged and roared and their tempers flared
and there were bombs bursting in the daylight air
and they'd run us off, do us in
but we came right back again
yeah, didn't we
shut it down
didn't we
November 30th, '99
millennium passing as the numbers climb
and the people came from everywhere
there musta been 50 thousand out there
there were farmers, unions, rank and file
every grass roots has it's own style
there were great big puppets two stories tall
there were drummers drummin' in the shoppin' mall
there were so many people that you couldn't see
how that many people got into the city
and the WTO delegates too
but we were locked down, so they couldn't get through
yeah, didn't we
shut it down
didn't we
November 30th, '99
lockdown at the police line
and they're hittin' you with everything they got
but you ain't movin', like it or not
and they're tyin' your wrists with plastic cuffs
and they're loadin' you up on a great big bus
and they're takin' you down to the navy base
pepper sprayin' you right in the face
try to break you down, try to get you to kneel
but you got the unity and this is for real
and they can't break a spirit that's comin' alive
that's the kind of spirit that's bound survive
didn't we
shut it down
didn't we
the media loves on the glitter and flash
and the newspapers talkin' out a whole lot of trash
about the violence of the people in black
and how the cops were so tired they just had to attack
and the secrets hidden in that deep dark hole
that they call City Hall may never be told
the mayor's out doin' the spin
the police chief quit so you can't ask him
well they can swear to god and all human law
but I was there and I know what I saw
and the visible stains'll wash away in the rains
but this old town'll never be the same
'cause didn't we
shut it down
didn't we
it's the greatest story ever told
David and Goliath, how you be so bold
standin' up to the giant when the goin' gets hot
and all you got is a slingshot
well they tell me that the world's turned upside down
you gotta pick it up and shake it, gotta turn it around
you gotta take it apart to rearrange it
I don't want to save the world I want to change it
don't let 'em tell you that it can't be done
'cause they're gonna be the first ones to run
just take a little lesson from Seattle town
WTO and how we shut it down
yeah, didn't we
shut it down
didn't we
- November 30th '99
David Rovics sings songs of social significance, about what
is really happening in Palestine, in the USA, in America,
in Europe, and he places his songs in a personal context,
like all good storytellers. Song for Ana Belen Montes from
his 2003 release Return (Al-awda) tells the story of a
woman who worked deep in the Pentagon establishment on
Caribbean policy in the Department of Defense. And was a
spy for Cuba.
"That is," says Rovics,
"she was committed to
a higher law, committed to
fighting US terrorism..."
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Twenty-five years was what the judge said
Then he banged his gavel and shook his head
You've done wrong, you broke our trust
Now we caught you and this is a bust
Now you'll spend these decades behind bars of steel
You thought you could play with us, but this is for real
He said you gave away secrets to the enemy
Now you'll live in prison in the land of the free
But here beneath this Cuban sun
I'd just like to thank you for all you've done
My heart today is torn apart
Ana Belen Montes, you are a spy after my own heart
"I obeyed my conscience rather than the law,"
so you said at your secret trial
You took no money for your work, so says your declassified file
You warned the Cubans of the plans of the assassins from the US
Just what other good deeds you did, they may never tell us
But here beneath this Cuban sun
I'd just like to thank you for all you've done
My heart today is torn apart
Ana Belen Montes, you are a spy after my own heart
High up in the ranks of the DoD you served the common good
Working alone, night and day, you did just what you should
Of all the great people I have known, there are
few that I'd call greater
Than one woman who obeyed a higher law, who the
judge called traitor
But here beneath this Cuban sun
I'd just like to thank you for all you've done
My heart today is torn apart
Ana Belen Montes, you are a spy after my own heart
"Humans became powerful because of our mastery of
language - the power of our stories," wrote Michigan poet
Rick Reese.
"We studied nature intensively, learned a great
deal about the ways of plants and animals, and built
stories around this knowledge. We learned stalking from the
cats, tracking from the wolves, deception from the possums,
trapping from the spiders, community from the apes, and joy
from the chipmunks. We learned the finest magic of all
beings, and enriched our stories with it. Stories are our
software. Stories are the heart and soul of every culture.
Stories define who we are, what we believe, and how we
behave. Stories are our most important and powerful
possessions."
Storytelling has been replaced in the modern world by
novels, which in turn have been replaced by packets of
pages containing words written to a specific formula
usually about the same subjects we see on cinema and
television screens - conflict, murder and war.
Some people tell it as it is.
Two women shine in this
patriarchal world as storytellers, an Indian woman called
Arundhati Roy and an American woman who calls herself
'Starhawk'. Roy is the best selling author of The God of
Small Things, a novel that is centered in Indian life but
rooted in the intimate tragedy of humanity - that our daily
rites of passage are consumed by the little things, that we
tell lies because it is easier than telling the truth and
that these add up to destroy families. A former
criptwriter, Roy has a prose style that is chatty, erudite,
passionate and witty. It brought her a global readership in
30 languages, and when the elites tried to co-opt her to
their world she shrugged her shoulders, content instead to
tell the world about the damage the World Bank were
causing in her country with their funding of the Narmada
Dam. Instead of writing another best-selling novel that
would enrich the corporate publishers of the western world
she wrote a book, The Cost of Living, about Narmada
Bachao Andolan - the alliance of indigenous peoples willing
to die to defend their land in the Narmada valley in the
north-west of India - criticising the Indian state over the
building of first world-funded dams. Roy's participation in
protests against big dams in India led to contempt of court
charges against her by the Supreme Court of India, which
eventually gave her a one-day jail sentence. This did not
shut her up; her subsequent books have been collections of
essays about globalisation and the role of the US in Chile,
Palestine, Israel and Iraq.
Starhawk has just returned from the West Bank, where she
was doing what she does very well - recording the daily
lives and actions of oppressed people and putting their
stories into the public domain. Her writings are the stuff
of real soap-opera. She too is a creative writer, conjuring
up stories about eco-spirituality, and she too decided her
talents were better employed telling the stories of those
who, for various reasons, are unable to speak to the world.
This is an extract from her April 9 report, Last Day on the
West Bank.
"After the last day of the women's training, we go home
with Arish to her village of Sarda, open the door in the
blank cement wall that faces the street, and enter a walled
garden, with mint and fava beans, fig trees and grape
vines, sages and roses lining the paths. In front of the
house is a wide porch, and on the sides and back are
courtyards. Arish brings us inside, to sit and drink tea
and admire a perfect model of the Al Aqsa Mosque made by
her brother, the engineer. Arish is young, in her early
twenties, not yet married, an artist and writer. She shows
us her drawings of her nieces and her mother, She has a
round, bronze face and half-moon eyes that crinkle up as
she smiles. Then the women beckon us out back, and we crowd
onto a low bench in a small, cement-block outbuilding. In
one corner is a sunken oven, heaped with coals and ashes
from burning olive pumice, what's left after the oil is
pressed. Arish's mother presides, patting out flat slabs of
dough, and Arish removes the lid which has a long, vertical
handle so they can lay them in the pit, replace the cover,
and heap the ashes on. After just a few moments, the bread
is done. Wide sheets of flat bread dripping with olive oil,
with flat leaves of zata sandwiched in, and thin pasties of
crisp, sweet bread basted with honey. They fill our hands
with it, and we eat as tea is poured. It's a warm, intimate
women's space, heated by the oven, like a sauna or a sweat
lodge, and we laugh and smile and eat. I have seen clay
models of this oven in sculptures thousands of years old.
Generations of women have patted the dough, baked the
bread, gathered at these hearths to gossip and laugh - a
warm and womblike female space in a male world. I feel so
safe, so welcomed, that I'm lulled into being happy, a
feeling I just can't shake as the afternoon goes on. In
spite of the harsh realities we've been discussing in the
training, the techniques for self-protection when facing
tear gas, sound bombs, rubber bullets, beatings, the ominous approach of the Wall
that will shatter the fabric of these villages, the
overwhelming oppressive realities of the occupation,
something strong and sweet as this honey bread survives.
For a little while longer."
Artists show us other ways of looking at the world.
Painters like the Belfast-born artist, Dermot Seymour,
reveal the obvious through their art, which can satirise
the politics of power. When asked why he painted cows all
the time he said,
"There are 8 million cattle in Ireland.
Bewildering, isn't it? It is often obvious to work with the
obvious..." But when the obvious is shown, as he did with
a painting of an Orangeman, a crumbled harp can and a cow,
he drew criticism from the Unionists because they claimed
he was taking the piss out of them.
Dermot was simply painting an obvious scene, yet taking the
piss is an old artistic tradition. In medieval Europe,
particularly in southern Europe, street theatre artists
deliberately took the piss out of the ruling elites. These
artists were called the giullari and they were the
beginnings of the street theatre we now know as Punch and
Judy and Zanni the clown. Giullari were wandering
performers, actors and comics who travelled from place to
place poking fun at church authority and rich people. Dario
Fo has continued this tradition, particularly with his play
Accidental Death of an Anarchist, which tells the story
of an anarchist called Giuseppe Pinelli who police said
fell out of an open window. Fo wrote his farce to show
people this was a lie, that police had pushed him to his
death. The Spacecraft street theatre group in Dublin took
Fo's plot to present Hypothetical Death of an Activist,
facilitated by Felicity Ford and Les Shine, to describe the
events behind the garda violence against the Reclaim the
Streets protest in 2002.
"The play," says Felicity,
"has a history of being
re-appropriated to various political situations, and it
lives as a continually evolving artwork, which Dario Fo has
generously given to anyone who wants to re-write it. It
acts as a common cultural reference point for events that
display similar characteristics across a globe where police
habitually abuse their power. It connects lots of activist
theatre groups in this way, and contests the idea of the
artist as some kind of specialised figure whose work is a
holy cow that can't be taken, played with, re-written, and
re-configured. The lack of ego with which Fo has passed
that script on to different groups is, to my mind, a really
progressive way of making a type of art that genuinely
encourages group input, co-operation, and discussion. I
believe art is made to make sense of the times; that it
does so on many levels, from personal through political
(for they are not really separate) and in terms of creating
art that is truly dissenting, an irreverence for external
forms of validation of expression, and an almost insane
confidence in the validity of one's own perception and
vision are to be highly encouraged among artists. It is my
fervent hope that healthy selves, not afraid to openly
reject the values of society, the counter-culture, or any
other dogmatic belief systems, are creating, as we speak,
inspiring artworks, plays, songs, and stories that will
encourage more to do the same. Inspiring each other is the
best way for us to engender change and hope. A sustainable
form of artistic resistance can be created only in the
presence of real affirmation and confidence."
Graciela Monteagudo is an Argentinian puppeteer who has
taken the tradition of the Giullari onto another level.
When Darío Santillán and Maximiliano Costeki were murdered
by police in Buenos Aires on June 26, 2002 Graciela joined
50,000 people who marched to the Plaza De Mayo to protest
the murders. In the days before the march Graciela
organised people to help her create what she called
"a
giant puppet street theatre piece". This piece led the
march through Buenos Aires, and is now seen a symbol of the
creative will of the unemployed peoples of Argentina.
Graciela tours the world with a unique puppet show. She
uses a variety of puppet styles, acting and singing, also
involving the audience. The main character is a woman, who
used to be a worker and is now picking up cardboard from
the streets of Buenos Aires every night to sell for a few
cents. The message, says Graciela,
"is about organising and struggling."
Images, like pictures and paintings, can portray a meaning
and get to the heart of an issue much quicker than the use
of words. Posters, which combine the subtle use of both
images and words, are an artistic outlet those who are
organising and struggling can use to great effect. The
posters created by the Dublin Grassroots Group to protest
Ireland's EU presidency and highlight a host of other
global issues are as poignant as they are creative. This
brings us back to the use of allegory and symbols. The
poster displayed showing the cutting of a barbed wire fence
could not be more dramatic as a symbol of protest against
borders and imprisonment. The second poster uses allegory.
There is a rich world of struggle out there and without our
creativity it would be a joyless place. Creative artists,
whether they are poets or puppeteers, bring that world
alive by sharing with the rest of us their ability to
dramatise daily events and to highlight the truth.
There are no implications for creative artists tackling
themes that are not part of the mainstream. Once art
becomes part of the mainstream it is no longer art, it is a
commodity, something that has to have a value. The images,
stories, songs and artistry of the corporate world are
manufactured items that serve a function for commerce, they
do not and never will be mistaken for creative art.
So all that is left for me to do now is leave the last
words with another creative artist, second-generation
Irish, English-born singer-songwriter Thea Gilmore, and a
line from her song, Mainstream.
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"If we grow up we're all going to be famous."
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–
Robert Allen
MORE TO GET YOUR HEAD INTO
Change the World without taking Power by John Holloway, Pluto Press, http://www.plutobooks.com
Running on Emptiness: The Pathology of Civilisation by John
Zerzan, Feral House, http://www.feralhouse.com
The Checkbook and the Cruise Missile: Conversations with
Arundhati Roy, Interviews by David Barsamian, South End
Press, http://www.southendpress.org
Power Politics by Arundhati Roy, South End Press,
http://www.southendpress.org
War Talk by Arundhati Roy, South End Press,
http://www.southendpress.org
The Algebra of Infinite Justice (The Cost of Living and
Power Politics) by Arundhati Roy, Flamingo
Webs of Power: Notes from the Global Uprising by Starhawk,
New Society Publishers, http://www.newsociety.com
Accidental Death of an Anarchist by Dario Fo, Methuen
Jim Page, http://www.jimpage.net
Sean Tyrrell, http://www.seantyrrell.com
David Rovics, http://www.davidrovics.com
Starhawk, http://www.starhawk.org
Dermot Seymour, http://www.dermotseymour.ie
Graciela Monteagudo, http://www.autonomista.org
Thea Gilmore, http://www.theagilmore.com
Robert Allen is the author of Dioxin War: Truth & Lies About A Perfect Poison, Pluto Press, London/Ann Arbor/Dublin and University of Michigan, US, published in July 2004. Amazon.co.uk, Amazon.com.
Book Description
This is a book about Dioxin, one of the most poisonous chemicals known to humanity. It was the toxic component of Agent Orange, used by the US military to defoliate huge tracts of Vietnam during the war in the 60s and 70s.
It can be found in pesticides, plastics, solvents, detergents and cosmetics. Dioxin has been revealed as a human carcinogen, and has been associated with heart disease, liver damage, hormonal disruption, reproductive disorders, developmental destruction and neurological impairment.
The Dioxin War is the story of the people who fought to reveal the truth about dioxin. Huge multinationals Dow and Monsanto both manufactured Agent Orange. Robert Allen reveals the attempts by the chemical industry, in collusion with regulatory and health authorities, to cover up the true impact of dioxin on human health. He tells the remarkable story of how a small, dedicated group of people managed to bring the truth about dioxin into the public domain and into the courts - and win.
Robert Allen is the author of No Global: The People of Ireland versus the Multinationals, Pluto Press, London/Ann Arbor/Dublin, published in April 2004. Amazon.co.uk, Amazon.com.
Book Description
Ireland's economy has seen phenomenal growth since the 1990s, as a result of an earlier decision by the state to chase foreign investment, largely from US corporates. As a result, manufacturers of raw chemicals, pharmaceuticals and highly dangerous substances came to Ireland, where they could make toxic products free from the strict controls imposed by other nations.
Robert Allen's book reveals the consequences to human health and the environment of the Irish state's love affair with the multinational chemical industry. The cost to Irish society was a series of ecological and social outrages, starting in the 1970s and continuing into the 2000s.
No Global is a lesson for countries who seek to encourage multinationals at the expense of the health their population and the delicate nature of their ecosystems. It is also a heart-warming record of the successful campaigns fought by local people to protect themselves and their environment from polluting industry
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