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In Earth Diplomacy, Jessica L. Horton reveals how Native American art in the mid-twentieth century mobilized Indigenous cultures of diplomacy to place the earth itself at the center of international relations. She focuses on a group of artists, including Pablita Velarde, Darryl Blackman, and Oscar Howe, who participated in exhibitions and lectures abroad as part of the United States's Cold War cultural propaganda. Horton emphasizes how their art modeled a radical alternative to dominant forms of statecraft, a practice she calls “earth diplomacy”: a response to extractive colonial capitalism grounded in Native ideas of deep reciprocal relationships between humans and other beings that govern the world. Horton draws on extensive archival research and oral histories as well as analyses of Indigenous creative work, including paintings, textiles, tipis, adornment, and artistic demonstrations. By interweaving diplomacy, ecology, and art history, Horton advances Indigenous frameworks of reciprocity with all beings in the cosmos as a path to transforming our broken system of global politics.

In Beyond the Sovereign Self Grant H. Kester continues the critique of aesthetic autonomy begun in The Sovereign Self, showing how socially engaged art provides an alternative aesthetic with greater possibilities for critical practice. Instead of grounding art in its distance from the social, Kester shows how socially engaged art, developed in conjunction with forms of social or political resistance, encourages the creative capacity required for collective political transformation. Among others, Kester analyzes the work of conceptual artist Adrian Piper, experimental practices associated with the escrache tradition in Argentina, and indigenous Canadian artists such as Nadia Myre and Michèle Taïna Audette, showing how socially engaged art catalyzes forms of resistance that operate beyond the institutional art world. From the Americas and Europe to Iran and South Africa, Kester presents a historical genealogy of recent engaged art practices rooted in a deep history of cultural production, beginning with nineteenth-century political struggles and continuing into contemporary anticolonial resistance and other social movements.

In The Sovereign Self, Grant H. Kester examines the evolving discourse of aesthetic autonomy from its origins in the Enlightenment through avant-garde projects and movements in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Kester traces the idea of aesthetic autonomy—the sense that art should be autonomous from social forces while retaining the ability to reflect back critically on society—through Kant, Schiller, Hegel, Marx, and Adorno. Kester critiques the use of aesthetic autonomy as the basis for understanding the nature of art and the shifting relationship between art and revolutionary praxis. He shows that dominant discourses of aesthetic autonomy reproduce the very forms of bourgeois liberalism that autonomy discourse itself claims to challenge. Analyzing avant-garde art and political movements in Russia, India, Latin America, and elsewhere, Kester retheorizes the aesthetic beyond autonomy. Ultimately, Kester demonstrates that the question of aesthetic autonomy has ramifications that extend beyond art to encompass the nature of political transformation and forms of anticolonial resistance that challenge the Eurocentric concept of “Man,” upon which the aesthetic itself often depends.

This book explores what art and artists can do to create democratic spaces, forms, and languages in a world devastated by multiple crises. Artists, activists, art historians, and art curators conduct timely and critical analyses across political divides, informing the public search for an agency, dialogue and self-representation. They analyze how artists transform these social relations through aesthetic means with a shared commitment to bridging political divides and conflicts. The book uses case studies from Australia, India, Mexico, USA, Turkey, Palestine, Israel, the Balkans, Russia, Italy, Ukraine to discuss the possibility or impossibility of building avenues for participation, equitable interaction, self-organization, as well as the common creation of the imaginary and a culture of dialogue. The book pushes for a broader and more conflict-oriented understanding of art and politics.

Signal is an ongoing book series dedicated to documenting and sharing compelling graphics, art projects, and cultural movements of international resistance and liberation struggles. Artists and cultural workers have been at the center of upheavals and revolts the world over, from the painters and poets in the Paris Commune to the poster makers and street theatre performers of the recent Occupy movement. Signal will bring these artists and their work to a new audience, digging deep through our common history to unearth their images and stories. We have no doubt that Signal will come to serve as a unique and irreplaceable resource for activist artists and academic researchers, as well as an active forum for critique of the role of art in revolution. In the US there is a tendency to focus only on the artworks produced within our shores or from English speaking producers. Signal reaches beyond those bounds, bringing material produced the world over, translated from dozens of languages and collected from both the present and decades past. Though it is a full-color printed publication, Signal is not limited to the graphic arts. Within its pages you will find political posters and fine arts, comics and murals, street art, site-specific works, zines, art collectives, documentation of performance and articles on the often overlooked but essential role all of these have played in struggles around the world. Highlights of the seventh volume of Signal include: Philadelphia Printworks: Maryam Pugh discusses the legacy and future of Black political art with John Morrison The Vinyl Records of Victor Jara: The world-wide impact of the nueva canción bard documented by Josh MacPhee Spectacular Commodities: Mehdi el Hajoui explores the objects of the Situationist International The Left Independistas: A fifty year retrospective of the graphics of the Catalan independence movement by Jordi Padró Hope in the Midst of Apathy: Vera Williams and the cover art of Liberation magazine by Alec Dunn Dario and Maxi: Natalia Revale documents the transformation of a Buenos Aires metro station We Will Break Open the Doors That Obscure the Sun: Erik Buelinckx uncovers the graphic work of the anarchist Belgian Expressionist Albert Daenens Giving Voice to the Voiceless: Bill Berkowitz interviews California printer and poster maker Malaquías Montoya

The first book to focus specifically on the late German artist Christoph Schlingensief's theatre work, it subversively merges art, politics and everyday life to imbue his productions both inside and outside the theatre with a re-energized concept of the political in art. Scheer traces Schlingensief's artistic lineage as a filmmaker with no formal training in theatre, whose work does not correspond to theoretical frameworks such as postdramatic theatre, Regietheater, or established categories of political theatre such as Brechtian, community, and agit-prop theatre. She explores how his work instead draws upon the highly performative gestures of the historical and post-Cold War avant-gardes as well the happenings and event-based practices of the sixties. Comprehensive case studies of six diverse theatrical and activist events are offered to demonstrate both the immediacy of Schlingensief's response to contemporary social and political events and his use of a range of artistic influences and different genres: Rocky Dutschke'68 (1996), Save Capitalism: Throw the Money Away! (1999) The Berlin Republic – or the Ring in Africa (1999) Hamlet (2001), Atta Atta – Art Has Broken Out! (2003) and the Church of Fear (2003). Key questions such as how his theatre functions as a provocation, and how an artist can insert themselves into the powerful flows of imagery produced by the perpetual global news cycle, form a coherent line of enquiry throughout each of the chapters. The significance of Schlingensief's artistic legacy of politicized theatre-making that pioneers new modes of active, aesthetic and public engagement in the political realm remains pertinent to topical socio-political debates and is of relevance to an international audience across a diversity of disciplines.

Signal is an ongoing book series dedicated to documenting and sharing compelling graphics, art projects, and cultural movements of international resistance and liberation struggles. Artists and cultural workers have been at the center of upheavals and revolts the world over, from the painters and poets in the Paris Commune to the poster makers and street theatre performers of the recent Occupy movement. Signal will bring these artists and their work to a new audience, digging deep through our common history to unearth their images and stories. We have no doubt that Signal will come to serve as a unique and irreplaceable resource for activist artists and academic researchers, as well as an active forum for critique of the role of art in revolution.Highlights of the sixth volume ofSignal include: Basement Workshop: The Genesis of New York's Asian American Resistance Culture Jamaa Al-Yad: An Interview with Daniel Drennan ElAwar La Escuela de Cultura Popular Revolucionaria Mártires del 68: Thirty Years of Collective Agitation in Mexico City The Appalachian Movement Press Adhesing Uprisings, and much more. In the US there is a tendency to focus only on the artworks produced within our shores or from English speaking producers. Signal reaches beyond those bounds, bringing material produced the world over, translated from dozens of languages and collected from both the present and decades past. Though it is a full-color printed publication, Signal is not limited to the graphic arts. Within its pages you will find political posters and fine arts, comics and murals, street art, site-specific works, zines, art collectives, documentation of performance and articles on the often overlooked but essential role all of these have played in struggles around the world.

Signal is an ongoing book series dedicated to documenting and sharing compelling graphics, art projects, and cultural movements of international resistance and liberation struggles. Artists and cultural workers have been at the center of upheavals and revolts the world over, from the painters and poets in the Paris Commune to the poster makers and street theatre performers of the recent Occupy movement. Signal will bring these artists and their work to a new audience, digging deep through our common history to unearth their images and stories. We have no doubt that Signal will come to serve as a unique and irreplaceable resource for activist artists and academic researchers, as well as an active forum for critique of the role of art in revolution.Highlights of the fifth volume ofSignal include: The Club de Grabado de Montevideo: Georgia Phillips-Amos unearths printmaking under dictatorship Three Print Collectives: Alec Dunn interviews Friends of Ibn Firnas, A3BC, and the Pangrok Sulap collective Survival by Sharing—Printing over Profit: Josh MacPhee interviews Paul Werner about the history of New York City's Come!Unity Press The Pyramid's Reign: Analyzing an enduring symbol of capitalism with Eric Triantafillou Empty Forms—Occupied Homes: Marc Herbst looks at the intersection between movement design and the struggle for housing in Barcelona Discs of the Gun: A trip through music and militancy in postwar Italy by Josh MacPhee In the US there is a tendency to focus only on the artworks produced within our shores or from English speaking producers. Signal reaches beyond those bounds, bringing material produced the world over, translated from dozens of languages and collected from both the present and decades past. Though it is a full-color printed publication, Signal is not limited to the graphic arts. Within its pages you will find political posters and fine arts, comics and murals, street art, site-specific works, zines, art collectives, documentation of performance and articles on the often overlooked but essential role all of these have played in struggles around the world.

Signal is an ongoing book series dedicated to documenting and sharing compelling graphics, art projects, and cultural movements of international resistance and liberation struggles. Artists and cultural workers have been at the center of upheavals and revolts the world over, from the painters and poets in the Paris Commune to the poster makers and street theatre performers of the recent Occupy movement. Signal will bring these artists and their work to a new audience, digging deep through our common history to unearth their images and stories. We have no doubt that Signal will come to serve as a unique and irreplaceable resource for activist artists and academic researchers, as well as an active forum for critique of the role of art in revolution.Highlights of the fourth volume ofSignal include: Imaging Palestine: Rochelle Davis and Emma Murphy take a look at Palestinian Affairs, one of the PLO's major publications Fighting Fire with Water: Lincoln Cushing discusses the Bay Area Peace Navy's large-scale visual interventions The Walls Speak Even If the Media Is Silent: Tennessee Watson documents a project made in response to the violence in Juárez Revolutionary Continuum: Jared Davidson cracks open New Zealand's Kotare Trust Poster Archive Kommune 1: Michael McCanne teases out the early years of West Germany's militant counterculture Illustrating the 3rd World: Josh MacPhee interviews Max Karl Winkler, book cover designer for Three Continents Press Dynamic Collectivity: Ryan Hayes traces the history of Toronto's Punchclock Printing Collective In the US there is a tendency to focus only on the artworks produced within our shores or from English speaking producers. Signal reaches beyond those bounds, bringing material produced the world over, translated from dozens of languages and collected from both the present and decades past. Though it is a full-color printed publication, Signal is not limited to the graphic arts. Within its pages you will find political posters and fine arts, comics and murals, street art, site-specific works, zines, art collectives, documentation of performance and articles on the often overlooked but essential role all of these have played in struggles around the world.

Signal is an ongoing book series dedicated to documenting and sharing compelling graphics, art projects, and cultural movements of international resistance and liberation struggles. Artists and cultural workers have been at the center of upheavals and revolts the world over, from the painters and poets in the Paris Commune to the poster makers and street theatre performers of the recent Occupy movement. Signal will bring these artists and their work to a new audience, digging deep through our common history to unearth their images and stories. We have no doubt that Signal will come to serve as a unique and irreplaceable resource for activist artists and academic researchers, as well as an active forum for critique of the role of art in revolution.Highlights of the third volume ofSignal include: Sonic Internationalism: An Interview with Paredon Records Founder Barbara Dane Game of Destruction: Deltor Stencils the Enemies of Socialism by Stephen Goddard Organized Artists/Reproductive Resistance: Reflecting on the Medu Arts Ensemble Quebec Spring: Striking Culture by David Widgington Memories of Revolution: Yugoslav Partisan Memorials by Robert Burghardt and Gal Kirn In the US there is a tendency to focus only on the artworks produced within our shores or from English speaking producers. Signal reaches beyond those bounds, bringing material produced the world over, translated from dozens of languages and collected from both the present and decades past. Though it is a full-color printed publication, Signal is not limited to the graphic arts. Within its pages you will find political posters and fine arts, comics and murals, street art, site-specific works, zines, art collectives, documentation of performance and articles on the often overlooked but essential role all of these have played in struggles around the world.