A database of art actions that have taken place as part of #OccupyWallStreet
If you would like your project to be added to the database, please email occupywithartNY@gmail.com
Friday, February 3, 2012 at 01:48AM an experiment
performed @ J29, Occupy Town Square
as intro to ThePeopleStaged
j29, occupy town square, performance in performance Wednesday, December 7, 2011 at 10:58AM 
“I Win. You Lose.” A Call to Action by students from the School of Visual Arts. Participants needed to occupy every corner on Wall Street and deliver a message…. !
WHAT, WHEN WHERE….
We are….
….shocked by the unabashed corruption and self-interest that runs rampant throughout corporate America.
….faced with a life-time of debt in the pursuit of an education.
…the 99%.
Energized by the ideals and actions of Occupy Wall Street, we want to make our message heard and let the 1% know we will not be ignored nor can our path be bypassed.
Occupy every corner of Wall Street and New York’s Financial District at lunch time participate in the action: “ I Win. You Lose. ”
Join us on Tuesday December 13, 2011.
Orientation meeting at 12:00 noon at Louise Nevelson Plaza Triangle (at the junction of Liberty St., Maiden Lane and William St.).
Action begins at 12:30.
For more information contact Kirby at:
http://www.twitter.com/kikibraga (twitter) | @kikibraga (ows) | http://www.IWin-YouLose.blogspot.com
ACTION DESCRIPTION
The action requires 2 participants who work in pairs. Each pair stands on a different corner of an intersection in the Financial District, and passes a piece of paper currency between them (currency note available at the orientation, or downloadable at IWin-YouLose.blogspot.com beginning Thursday, December 8th). The first participant (X) passes the currency to the other (Z). As Z accepts the money, she/he says, “I win. You lose.” The recipient (Z) then passes it back to (X) who repeats the phrase, “I win. You lose.” The action is performed slowly, deliberately, and articulately (clear projected voice, not yelling), without “acting,” and is repeated for 60 minutes ad infinitum, ad nauseum.
FOR MORE INFORMATION:
More information coming including downloadable pdf, etc by Thursday, December 8th
For more information contact:
http://www.twitter.com/kikibraga (twitter) | @kikibraga (ows) | http://www.IWin-YouLose.blogspot.com
If possible, please RSVP so that we can have an estimate of how many participants will attend; but if you can’t join us any way!
education, game, performance, sva, zuccotti in interventions, performance Tuesday, November 29, 2011 at 10:55PM Occupy Museums to protest the anti-democratic policies of Lincoln Center and Bloomberg on the last performance of Satyagraha Thursday December 1, 2011 at 10:30PM.
It is no doubt timely that Philip Glass' opera 'Satyagraha'--which depicts Gandhi's early struggle against colonial oppression in South Africa--should be revived by the Metropolitan Opera in 2011, a year which has seen popular revolutions in North Africa, mass uprisings in Europe, and the emergence of Occupy Wall Street protests in the United States.
Yet we see a glaring contradiction in ‘Satyagraha’ being performed at the Lincoln Center where in recent weeks protestors from Occupy Wall Street have been arrested and forcibly removed for exercising their First Amendment rights to peaceful public assembly.
It’s also a striking irony that Bloomberg L.P is one of the Lincoln Center’s leading corporate sponsors. Mayor Michael Bloomberg has stifled free speech, free press, and freedom of assembly in an aggressive campaign against Occupy Wall Street protestors in New York City that has influenced a crackdown on the protests nationally. The juxtaposition is stark: while Bloomberg funds the representation of Gandhi's pioneering tactics of nonviolent civil disobedience in the Metropolitan Opera House, he simultaneously orders a paramilitary-style raid of the peaceful public occupation of Liberty Park, blacking out the media, while protestors are beaten, tear-gassed, and violently arrested.
Satyagraha is a Sanskrit word meaning "truth-force," and we at Occupy Wall Street, by exercising tactics of nonviolent direct action inspired by those championed by Gandhi, have insisted that the truth be told:
Our commons have been stolen from us to profit the wealthiest 1%. We have lost homes, jobs, affordable education, natural resources, and access to public space. Our culture has been co-opted by a corporate elite. Many suffer so a few may thrive.
Previously, Occupy Museums and other OWS groups came to Lincoln Center to protest the "generous philanthropy" of David H. Koch, the funder of the Tea Party and of anti-global warming research, who uses philanthropic contributions to the former New York State Theater to whitewash his misanthropic reputation and write off his taxes. We will return again to Lincoln Center, where 'Satyagraha' has inspired us to once again challenge the ruthless nexus of power and wealth and reclaim our public space and common dignity.
We would like to announce two actions:
✔A General Assembly at 10:30 PM at Lincoln Center. Join us in an open conversation about the effects of increased privatization and corporatization of all aspects of society, and the use of nonviolent civil disobedience around the world to reclaim the commons.
* Composer Philip Glass will join the general assembly and mic-check a statement.
✔If permission is not granted to protest on Lincoln Center plaza by Thursday evening, some members of Occupy Wall Street will enact a hunger strike. They will not end this strike until their demands are met, starting with the demand that Lincoln Center and the City of New York guarantee the freedoms of speech and assembly on the city-owned plazas and walkways of Lincoln Center. Occupy Museums stand in solidarity with these hunger strikers and offer support for this courageous form of protest.
The symbolic opening of this space for protest stands for the spaces all over the city and country that we vow to liberate from the control of the 1% for the full use of the public.
action, intervention, occupy museums, ows, performance, philip glass in interventions, performance Saturday, November 19, 2011 at 11:14PM Massive 24-hour DRUM CIRCLE and JAM SESSION party starting tomorrow, Sunday at 2pm, outside Mayor Bloomberg's personal townhouse: 17 East 79th Street.
Tie-dye, didgeridoo, hackeysack welcome! No shirt, no shoes, no problem! And if you don't have talent, don't worry: FREE DRUM LESSONS offered! Also on offer: collaborative drumming with the police!
Even though this is a 24-hour drum circle, don't be late! The mayor loves evictions. Who knows what'll happen? In any case, there'll be an afterparty in world-famous Central Park right afterwards.
www.yeslab.org/drumcircle
action, bloomberg, drum circle, intervention, performance, yes men in interventions, performance Tuesday, November 8, 2011 at 05:44PM Artist Ehud Darash presented his planned intervention at 16 Beaver last night.
Please join him in making this action happen:
Description: We are going to fall, very slowly - from standing to laying down, in the vicinity of Zuccotti Park. It is an artistic action that is adressed *to* OWS, celebrating the diversity of this movement by introducing to it a temporary "otherness" - a different way of being.
We will meet at the red cube for a short teach-in and an explanation of the background of this gesture and practice.
The following is an example of previous renditions of the action:
ehud darash, intervention, liberty plaza, ows, performance, zuccotti in interventions, performance Tuesday, November 8, 2011 at 05:42PM 
Stravinsky’s timeless and haunting “L’histoire du Soldat” (“The Soldier’s Tale”), a parable for three actors and seven musicians, will be performed for Occupy Wall Street at Zuccotti Park by Broadway actors and New York musicians on Nov. 3rd from 5-6pm, with a possible additional performance on Nov. 4th.
*(NOTE: Nov. 4th is our back-up rain delay date! We’ll keep you posted!)*
Stravinsky and C.F. Ramuz’s hour-long tale/ballet/oratorio tells the story of a Soldier on leave to see his sweetheart. Nearly home, he is sidetracked by the Devil. In an infernal insider-trading scheme, the Soldier gains a magic book that tells the future of the economy, but, in return, must give up his precious violin. Imprisoned - by the Devil, his newfound wealth, and his own delusions - this veteran is separated from his loved ones and true happiness. This fairy tale, spoken in sparkling verse to some of Stravinsky’s most charming and memorable music, is about the complex nature of greed, and the meaning and price of freedom. Its themes resonate effortlessly with the aims and ideals of the Occupy Wall Street movement.
Starring famed New York actors Erik Liberman (Broadway, “LoveMusik,” Helen Hayes-Award Winner for “Merrily We Roll Along”), Elizabeth Stanley (Broadway, “Company,” “Cry-Baby,”), and Nick Choksi (“Invasion” at The Flea, “Twelfth Night” with Sonnet Rep, regular on “One Life to Live”), and with some of New York’s finest contemporary music performers conducted by Ryan McAdams, this one-time-only performance explores the relationships between money, love, and happiness through a fairy tale that is, like all great fairy tales, beautiful, terrifying, funny, and deeply moving.
liberty plaza, music, ows, performance, stravinsky, zuccotti in music, performance, sound Sunday, November 6, 2011 at 07:32PM A group of artists, curators and art critics are planning an action at the Berlin Deutsche Guggenheim on the 7th of November at 3pm.
Re-functioning the Semi-Public in participation with the Deutsche Guggenheim:
Deutsche Guggenheim as Questions Platform
The Deutsche Guggenheim has people who walk around with little signs that read, "Ask me a question" or "Frag mich." So, that's exactly what we will do. We plan to enter the Museum incognito and at a specific moment take out signs from bags or from under our clothes and silently hold them up. Each sign will ask a question related to contemporary art world and the inequalities thereof, one side in German, the other in English.
We found this to be the most appropriate form of protest as it is both physically non-violent and ideological non-violent, simply posing questions in an institute that claims to be for the public benefit and has hired people walking around asking for questions.
The Deutsche Guggenheim in Berlin is a small room on the ground floor of the skyscraper of the bank, above 100 art works are found on display. Overall, the museum functions as a lobby of the bank exhibiting its most creative form of fund-diversification. I have one friend who work at the DeutscheGuggenheim. No one is being "assaulted." This has been a major concern of ours from the beginning- not to accuse anyone of anything, even though there is a lot of accountability at hand. The point is trying to subvert the very mechanisms of the museum, and by doing so critically calling into question the museum's and the Deutsche Bank's role in the great inequality of workers in the arts, how the vast majority make barely a living wage while a tiny fraction make sickening amounts of money. Or should we simply accept that 99% of artists are mediocre, perhaps they are, but should this boundary one must cross from being a bad artist to being a "good"(commercial successful) artist be so extreme?
Perhaps a concern is that we will not actually be open for dialogue/ asking extremely passive aggressive questions that deny a possible answer, or attempt at/ a beginning of answering. This is not our intention and we believe this relatively minor action could ultimately be of some benefit for the museum.
Below is a link to a model of successful "questioning" that is not accusatory, even when dealing with people who normally would be on the other side of the fence, and that ultimately makes people, simply put, think. That doesn't force them to identify with a certain group and that does not put them on the defensive. This too is our goal. Otherwise, we can only expect the expected.
Sunday, October 23, 2011 at 12:20AM 
The game is up: we see through the pyramid schemes of the temples of cultural elitism controlled by the 1%. No longer will we, the artists of the 99%, allow ourselves to be tricked into accepting a corrupt hierarchical system based on false scarcity and propaganda concerning absurd elevation of one individual genius over another human being for the monetary gain of the elitest of elite. For the past decade and more, artists and art lovers have been the victims of the intense commercialization and co-optation or art. We recognize that art is for everyone, across all classes and cultures and communities. We believe that the Occupy Wall Street Movement will awaken a consciousness that art can bring people together rather than divide them apart as the art world does in our current time…
Let’s be clear. Recently, we have witnessed the absolute equation of art with capital. The members of museum boards mount shows by living or dead artists whom they collect like bundles of packaged debt. Shows mounted by museums are meant to inflate these markets. They are playing with the fire of the art historical cannon while seeing only dancing dollar signs. The wide acceptance of cultural authority of leading museums have made these beloved institutions into corrupt ratings agencies or investment banking houses- stamping their authority and approval on flimsy corporate art and fraudulent deals.
For the last few decades, voices of dissent have been silenced by a fearful survivalist atmosphere and the hush hush of BIG money. To really critique institutions, to raise one’s voice about the disgusting excessive parties and spectacularly out of touch auctions of the art world while the rest of the country suffers and tightens its belt was widely considered to be bitter, angry, uncool. Such a critic was a sore loser.
It is time to end that silence not in bitterness, but in strength and love! Because the occupation has already begun and the creativity and power of the people has awoken! The Occupywallstreet Movement will bring forth an era of new art, true experimentation outside the narrow parameters set by the market. Museums, open your mind and your heart! Art is for everyone! The people are at your door!
intervention, museum, occupy wall street, ows, performance, protest in interventions, performance occupennial, occupy wall street, performance in audio, interventions, music, sound Saturday, October 15, 2011 at 11:44PM The Box Project by Abbigael Beddall
In early 2009 Abbigael Beddall began the production of 1000 handmade boxes using unique scraps of paper from a variety of sources. Now -- having tagged, priced, numbered, signed, and fully documented the works – they are ready for free distribution in exchange of a signature in her catalogue. (Much like a receipt or petition.)
Beddall will distribute the boxes, valued at $2,178,508,724 combined, to individuals at the Occupy Wall Street site on October 15, 2011 from 12noon to 2:00pm. The artist sees the project as her contribution to the economy as those accepting the boxes will see their individual assets increase accordingly.
The boxes help "stimulate the economy while highlighting our failed systems of value,” says Beddall. The performance scratches far beneath the surface, simultaneously mocking and creating economic exchange that flies in the face of those who have decided they are global decision makers.
The first 500 boxes will be distributed in New York City October 15, 2011 on Wall Street next to the bull's ass.
The last 500 boxes will be given away in Washington DC on October 22, 2011 at Freedom Plaza, Pennsylvania Ave. NW (between the Department of Treasury and U.S. Capitol).
occupy wall st, ows, performance in performance Saturday, October 15, 2011 at 10:33PM We have a window here, change will happen, to begin to think about what is wanted, not not wanted, has many levels of meaning and action. In order to properly Notarize these statements I need valid Identification. As one attests to who they are (that is actually what I am notarizing) they must form their thoughts about what a new world might look like, dually they state these envisionments, and by this act, include themselves in helping to make their vision a reality. Its illocutionary, my dear. Actually in the laws of the Notary, we are held to what we say (and we must say what we say Aloud!), or we will be committing perjury. However I do not threaten perjury to happy occupiers and visitors, but an opportunity to think for themselves what it is they want. This is not by consensus, but will be made into a collection. I plan to make this into a document that can stand as an archive of thoughts of this time of change. To be used in what way seems best, a library, for further action, research - however, as time will tell. For now it is important to document this sentiment and initiate the forming and annunciation of these affirmations.
yesireepublicnotary.wordpress.com
notary, occupy wall st, ows, performance Saturday, October 8, 2011 at 12:59PM The Arts and Culture working group of OWS encouraged all protesters to dress as corporate zombies on Monday October 3rd
Intention:
*As we in part are reacting against the unquenchable greed of the corporate system in place now, the zombie seems an appropriate metaphor to embody, as a reflection for those that work in the area, to perceive their actions with a new understanding.
*We encourage participants to dress, if possible, in corporate- esque attire (suits and ties for men, corporate wear for women). As it is Halloween time, white face paint and fake blood can be readily found. Get creative. Maybe the Zombies are eating monopoly money, or drinking from what looks like oil, etc. Maybe you are more of a Thriller Zombie that just wants to boogie.
march, occupy wall st, ows, performance, zombie in performance Saturday, October 8, 2011 at 12:58PM Aaron Burr Society and Noah Fischer
"Today, September 22nd, 2011 is the last day of Summer. And tomorrow is the beginning of the Fall...of the Empire of Greed. These coins, though insignificant in value, are the seeds of change for a new nation built on equality and justice" With these words, spoken before the New York Stock Exchange, the seven performances of the Summer of Change conclude. We distributed each American numismatic currency from the dollar to the penny at the feet of the Gods of Wall Street in a bid to break through the mythology of Free Markets. Today we marched from Liberty Park, currently occupied as a democratic "Free Zone" in the mode of Tahrir Square (Egypt) and Puerta del Sol(Spain) to Wall Street- scattering the seeds of change as we walked.
http://www.summerofchange.net/
money, occupy wall st, ows, performance in performance Saturday, October 8, 2011 at 12:34PM grafitti, light, occupy wall st, ows, performance in performance 