Steve Lambert

wrote a book!!!

Yearly Archives: 2017

C4AA Workshop in Guinea, West Africa

The C4AA travelled to Guinea, West Africa in December to train local artists how they can use their practice to fight corruption in the region.

We worked with actors, comics, visual artists, poets, from Guinea, Nigeria, Burkina Faso, Senegal, and other neighboring countries. We ran a bi-lingual workshop through simultaneous interpretation in French, and translating all our written materials into French (see projection on right).

The wealth of natural resources in the region and how poorly distributed that wealth is can make anyone with a heart take another long look at socialism. Because of corruption, basic services in the largest city in the country like water and sewer, electricity, and trash collection don’t exist.

This beach was not exceptional – it’s the result of a lack of basic municipal services like garbage collection. It’s very frustrating to see.

All this has real effects on public health.

Don’t worry, my malaria medicine was preventative. But the public health threats are very real — Ebola killed over 2500 just a few years ago — and preventable as well.

Guinea has more natural resources, minerals, and fresh water than most countries on the continent. However, the wealth is exported along with the resources and what remains is in the hands of a few corrupt leaders. So the country remains criminally underdeveloped. On the first day there, I remember saying to the friend hosting us, “other countries have had revolutions over less than this.” They, of course, knew this.

As frustrating as it was to learn about, I was glad to be able to be helping those striving to make changes. Our curriculum is designed as a framework so those with the local knowledge and culture can adapt the foundational ideas to their context.

And we had fun.

In this group are some of the top comedians and actors in the region, dancers and choreographers, the founder of an all-female photographers association in Mali, and leaders of local theater and arts organizations. They will continue to use the work we did together and adapt it to the region and issues they’re working on.

Imagine Winning

11×17 Risograph

Created in edition of 100 as thank you for the Center for Artistic Activism end of year fundraising campaign.

The IMAGINE WINNING print features an image from the 1913 Suffrage Pageant in Washington, D.C., with the actress Hedwig Reicher as Columbia. On March 3, 1913 more than 8000 women took to the streets with incredible costumes, nine bands, four brigades on horseback, 20 floats, and this performance near the Treasury Building. This was the beginning of photography and already these women knew how to craft a photo. The marchers were demanding an amendment to the Constitution but were harassed and assaulted by mobs of thousands of men as police looked on. The suffragettes were undeterred and the struggle continued throughout the country. In 1920, the Nineteenth Amendment secured the vote for women.

The print is made with a Risograph printer. Similar to silkscreening, riso printing enables a layering technique to produce multi-colored prints. It’s printed on high-quality Speckletone paper, the first-ever recycled sheet with flecks and “shives” created in 1955 by the French Paper Co.

The Discourses of Capitalism Book

I’m honored that my research with the capitalism sign was able to further research in the field of economics and linguistics. The Discourses of Capitalism: Everyday Economists and the Production of Common Sense “examines the discourses of capitalism taken up by people in their responses to a street art installation created by Steve Lambert, entitled Capitalism Works For Me! True/False.”

Christian W. Chun poured through the raw video interviews we recorded at Times Square, throughout London, Cedar Rapids, and Boston  and uses that source material to consider several key questions, including:

  • How do everyday people view and make sense of capitalism and its role in their work and personal lives?
  • What are the discourses they use in their common-sense understandings of the economy to defend or reject capitalism as a system?

“Chun looks at how dominant discourses in social circulation operate to co-construct and support capitalism, and the accompanying counter-discourses that critique it.”

Get it: amazon, libary

Give us the Vote at Arts Westchester

I’ll be showing Wealth or Happiness and Defeat the Ghosts at Give us the Vote at Arts Westchester.

Give Us The Vote at Arts Westchester

Opening Reception:

Saturday, October 7, 2017 | 4-6PM
Honoring our Community Partner, The League of Women Voters of White Plains.
Suggested donation $10 at door

ARTISTS

Natalie Baxter
Nicole Bricker
Robert Brush
Zoe Buckman
Tom Fruin
Laurel Garcia Colvin
Johanna Goodman
Gregg Guest
Carla Rae Johnson
Yashua Klos
Steve Lambert
Miguel Luciano
Ann Lewis
Rebecca Mushtare
Michele Pred
Lise Prown & Curt Belshe
Philippe Safire
Jeffrey Schrier
Richard Tomasello

On View: October 10 2017 — January 27, 2018

WHERE: ArtsWestchester Gallery
31 Mamaroneck Avenue
White Plains, NY

Gallery Hours: Tue — Fri, 12-5pm | Sat 12-6pm

Opening Day Program: Saturday, October 7, 2017, 3pm
Opening Reception: Saturday, October 7, 2017, 4-6pm

ArtsWestchester’s “Give Us The Vote” is inspired by the 100th anniversary of women’s suffrage in New York State. This contemporary art exhibition in downtown White Plains examines the state of voting rights in America today.

The idea that American democracy is government “by the people, for the people” is fundamental to our national identity, yet the history of who has access to the ballot box in America is troubled. The right to vote is the most contested in American democracy. “Give Us the Vote” is a contemporary art exhibition inspired by the one hundredth anniversary of the victory for women’s voting rights in New York State, and examines the state of voting rights in America today.

The suffragist movement was one of the most powerful grassroots political movement of the 20th century. Women and men from all walks of life rallied together to win women an equal say in the democratic process and full recognition as citizens. The battle for the ballot raged through the Civil Rights Movement leading to the Voting Rights Act of 1965, ensuring that the right to vote would not be denied on account of race or color. Still, not every citizen has equal access to the polls. Each election cycle reveals remaining disenfranchised populations and raises controversy about who should, can and does vote. In addition to recognizing the achievements of the suffragists, artworks will address the many enduring barriers to the ballot including gerrymandering, stringent voter registration requirements, voter registration roll purges, and revisions to the Voting Rights Act.

Photos from the exhibition

Photos by Margaret Fox

Eyeo 2017 Closing Talk

This summer I gave the closing talk at the 2017 Eyeo Festival in Minneapolis. I used the opportunity to ask the attendees — artists, engineers from tech companies, marketers — to volunteer their skills working with social movements. And I included some stories I’d been eager to tell about the 2016 AIDS Conference!

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