Handbook: Artistic Strategies in Real Politics
This section reconstructs content from the original truthisconcrete.org, preserved via the Wayback Machine. The 2012 Truth Is Concrete marathon camp and the 2014 handbook published by Sternberg Press collected 100 artistic strategies for political engagement from artists, activists, and theorists worldwide.
About the Handbook
How does art play a role in social and political struggles all over the world? Can it be a tool with which to shape the world rather than just reflect it? The handbook maps the broad field of engaged art and artistic activism through strategies, interviews, and graphic contributions — each one a concrete answer to the question of what art can do when it enters the arena of real politics.
Essays by Stephen Duncombe & Steve Lambert, Alanna Lockward, Chantal Mouffe, Florian Malzacher, Gerald Raunig & Jonas Staal. Interviews conducted by Florian Malzacher, Kira Kirsch, Anne Faucheret, and Johanna Rainer.
Strategies & Contributions
- Iconoclasistas — Counter-Cartographies as Collective Resistance
- Tzortzis Rallis — Graphic Commentary on Crisis
- Aseem Trivedi — Cartoons Against Corruption
- Seth Tobocman — Radical Comics and Visual Resistance
- Dan Perjovschi — Drawing Dissent on Museum Walls
- Ganzeer — Revolutionary Street Art in Cairo
- Absent — Street Satire in Crisis-Era Greece
- Josef Schützenhöfer — Liberation in Progress
- Léo Lima — Favela Photography as Political Record
- Jisun Kim — Art as Legal Shoplifting
- Marina Naprushkina — Office for Anti-Propaganda
- Khaled Jarrar — Art at the Checkpoint
- Anton Litvin — Constructivist Visual Resistance
- FEMEN — The Body as Protest Medium
- Nenad Duda Petrović — The OTPOR! Fist as Visual Weapon
- The Pinky Show — Radical Metaeducation by Cats
- IRWIN — Examining How Ideology Works
Interviews
- Sofiane Belhaj — Cyber Dissent and the Tunisian Revolution
- Laila Soliman — Theatre as a Tool Against Official Truths
- Voina — The Art Is to Make Politics
- Eclectic Electric Collective — Inflatables as Tactical Frivolity
- Noah Fischer — Occupy a Museum Near You
- Jeudi Noir — Artistic Strategies for Housing Justice
- David van Reybrouck — Populism, Democracy, and Art’s Limits
- Gabriela Rendón and Miguel Robles-Durán — We Cannot Be Pessimistic
- Harrison Chege — Graphic Witness from Nairobi
Further Context
The original handbook, published by Sternberg Press in April 2014 and edited by steirischer herbst and Florian Malzacher, collected 100 original contributions alongside essays and conversations. This reconstruction draws on archived web content to preserve the strategies, interviews, and graphic contributions that were publicly available on truthisconcrete.org.
Contributors to the full handbook include: Adbusters, Jonathan Allen, Udi Aloni, Hector Aristizabal, Artleaks, Katherine Ball, Leah Borromeo, Andrew Boyd, Tania Bruguera, Boris Buden, Carlos Celdran, Center for Political Beauty, Chto Delat, Church of Kopimism, Santiago Cirugeda, Corrupt Tour, Gabriela Csoszó, Minerva Cuevas, Neil Cummings, Diedrich Diederichsen, Charles Esche, Roza El Hassan, Noah Fischer, Andrea Fraser, Isabelle Fremeaux, Christine Gaigg, Ganzeer, Federico Geller, Marina Gržinić, Núria Güell, Erdem Gündüz, Hans Haacke, Stefano Harney, Carl Hegemann, Iconoclasistas, Institute for Human Activities, International Institute for Political Murder (IIPM), Janez Janša, Khaled Jarrar, Anna Jermolaewa, Jeudi Noir, John Jordan, Kaddu Yarrax, Kavecs, Janice Kerbel, Jisun Kim, Omer Krieger, Mierle Laderman Ukeles, André Lepecki, Lexxus Legal, Lawrence Liang, Liberate Tate, Geert Lovink, Matteo Lucchetti, Oliver Marchart, Joana Mazza, Tomislav Medak, Markus Miessen, Monochrom, Mosireen, Jean Luc Moulène, Rabih Mroué, Michael Murin, Marina Naprushkina, Neue Slovenische Kunst (NSK), Occuprint, Ahmet Öğüt, Robyn Orlin, Sibylle Peters, Pixadores, Srđa Popović, Raivo Puusemp, Raumlaborberlin, Reverend Billy, Richard Reynolds, Scott Rigby, Irit Rogoff, Florian Schneider, Shared Inc., Gregory Sholette, Stevphen Shukaitis, Mladen Stilinović, Kuba Szreder, Claire Tancons, The Haircut Before The Party, The Laboratory of Insurrectionary Imagination (LABOFII), The Pinky Show, The Vacuum Cleaner, The Yes Men, Tiqqun, Tools for Action, Ultrared, Marina Vishmidt, VOINA, Joanna Warsza, WochenKlausur, Stephen Wright, Yomango, Salam Yousri, Wu Yuren, and others.