is both an art gallery and blog project. As the US Postal Service delivers political junk mail to my home, I collage it into new messages I want to hear from presidential hopefuls. The cut, rearranged, and pasted words of Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama, John McCain, and other candidates will be displayed in the Urbana-Champaign Independent Media Center and Sea and Space, a Los Angeles art gallery, throughout the 2008 election.
The other aspect of the project is this site. Here, bloggers can leave notes as to what they would personally like to hear from the candidates. Take a few moments to consider what you’ve been hearing or not hearing, then post what you wish the candidates would say and/or do. Your thoughts will be assembled, redistributed, and considered part of the exhibition. Each day, I will take 100 of the comments posted here and upload them to the candidates’ official blogs from May 7 - November 4, 2008.
The Urbana-Champaign Independent Media Center will present the Audacity of Desperation: confronting, expressing and unraveling states of desperation, from May 7 – June 4, 2008. Artworks by concerned people, made in multiple editions are free for distribution at an opening party on May 7th at 7:00 pm and throughout the exhibition. The closing party on June 4, at 7:00 pm will include Continental Drift, an itinerant discussion on Neoliberal policies and cracks in global power, traveling through the Radical Midwest Cultural Corridor, with presentations by Kevin Hamilton, Brian Holmes, Ayreen Anastas, and Rene Gabri.
October 23 – November 16, Sea and Space, Los Angeles will continue the Audacity of Desperation, with an opening reception on October 25 and election countdown on November 4, 2008. More information can be found at www.desperationexhibition.blogspot.com.
