10/16/2020 0 Comments Newsela Article for the weekIt's up to people to change the system: The artists using stamps as resistance Political statements from artists in 2020 typically have been on the streets, with murals and protest signs. However, the envelope is the object of a new art project. Since a stamp symbolizes the mail-in vote, it has come to represent a form of resistance and action. The New York nonprofit organization TRANS> has created a stamp project called "These Times." The project features 50 artists and institutions that stress the urgency of voting. The stamps are available both online and in sticker form. "The post office is at the helm of democracy," said Sandra Antelo-Suarez. She is leading the project. "It's our civic duty to vote." Mail has been especially important this year because of the spread of COVID-19. It is an election year for the U.S. Changes to the postal service have slowed down mail delivery, which worries some people as they plan to vote by mail. More people want to vote by mail because of the coronavirus. In March, when COVID-19 was spreading, Antelo-Suarez was frustrated. "I wanted to create a response, thinking about how culture and the art world could respond," she said. She asked artists to do a project that would bring art to people's homes. "I thought: stamps." Zoom-in Image 2. Alejandra Seeber's stamp depicts the phrase, "Futuro" (meaning "future"), made of kiss-shaped stamps. She created the stamp with her 11-year-old daughter. Design: Alejandra Seeber. Photo: TRANS> A Stamp With The Power To End InjusticeAntelo-Suarez asked 50 artists to "make a gesture in an artwork that's a tribute to our culture, which is being lost." "I told them to imagine their stamp has the power to end injustice in the world. It's up to the people, not the politicians, to vote, to change the system." The stamp artworks have no stamp value in the U.S. postal system. They will be distributed in the October issue of the Frieze art magazine. A total of 50,000 sticker stamps will be printed. "People forget the simplicity of a stamp," she said. Each stamp will be posted on social media. The artists in the project are in the United States, Germany, Japan, Spain, Portugal and Ibero-America, which includes places where Spanish or Portuguese are the main languages. A Very Important Election"I saw the devastation in New York and across Ibero-America" and especially the effect the coronavirus has had on their culture and artistic communities, said Antelo-Suarez. She wanted "to bring artists and thinkers together to create a space for grief, but also for hope and action." The stamps are a tribute to the lives lost to the illness. They also urge Americans to vote. "I believe culture is a very important platform of initiating change and dialogues," she said. "How do we become united?" It comes down to Americans voting in the election in November. "Democracy could be taken away, not just from Americans, but from the entire world," said Antelo-Suarez. She said this is a very important election, as President Donald Trump runs against former Vice President Joe Biden. "I've never seen things so polarized in the U.S.," she said. Each stamp has artwork with the name of the artist, the art institution they most recently worked at and the country. A Tool To Talk About Voting And DemocracyThe Spanish artist Santiago Sierra created a stamp spelling out the word NO. It's taken from his No Global Tour, an ongoing project where he brings a large sculpture that spells out NO to cities across the globe. Zoom-in Image 3. Albanian artist Anri Sala's stamp depicts a clenched fist and the phrase, "The egg tomorrow will be a chicken." Design: Anri Sala. Photo: TRANS> "'No' is the only vocabulary to use in the face of power," said Sierra. "These are times of attack on populations, times to draw a line in the sand and say from there you do NOT pass." The stamp Alejandra Seeber designed has the word "Futuro," meaning future, on it. The word is made up of kiss-shaped stamps. She created it with her 11-year-old daughter. "The Latin minority was hit hard by COVID-19, so a word in Spanish seemed appropriate," said the Argentinian artist. "The current post office conflict allows me to use this stamp as a tool to talk about democracy, voting, and conflict" in American institutions. Designing A Visually Strong LogoMateo López, an artist from Colombia, created a stamp with a red shape that resembles a heart. "I just thought of designing a logo, something visually strong," he said. "Like a text message saying, 'I care,' 'I love you' or 'Thinking of you.'" The artist Anri Sala, from Albania, designed a stamp showing a clenched resistance fist. The phrase "The egg tomorrow will be a chicken" is written on it. "I grew up in a society where having the right to choose and cast a vote were not 'given' until relatively recently," said Sala. "I'm acutely aware that when we cast our votes, we both take a stake in our future and honor past struggles we owe our freedom to."
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