Here is a well-researched, concise guide to protest art, exploring what happens when artists join forces with radical political movements to foster change. The works and movements discussed emerged at times of great upheaval, war, colonialism, independence and changes of government, and reveal how art and politics have been intertwined throughout the 20th and early 21st centuries.

Jessica Lack adopts an inclusive and international approach, presenting examples from nations and societies around the globe, including: Sylvia Pankhurst’s paintings depicting the harsh realities faced by women manual workers in early 1900s Britain; the revolutionary aesthetic created by Emory Douglas for the Black Panthers in the 1960s, which documented and galvanized the campaign for the rights of Black Americans; Nandalal Bose’s portrait of Mahatma Gandhi, which became the iconic symbol of the Indian non-violence movement in the 1930s; and the Chilean direct action work that contributed to the collapse of General Pinochet’s government.

Each of the nine chapters addresses different ways in which art has been used to effect political transformation, taking in humour and satire, performance and propaganda, art’s relationships to institutions, the media, conflict and the state, and its uses as a weapon, a galvanizing force and a way of refusing the status quo. Artistic acts, collectives and movements are examined in their context, revealing how they have influenced other artists and changed the wider political and artistic world.

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This volume critically profiles, contextualizes, and theoretically elaborates the unique practice of the UK-based German artist Kathrin Böhm. Combining visual and textual material, it offers an overview of Böhm’s exceptional modus operandi that is rooted in a highly original artistic synthesis of a range of practices. Over the last three decades, Böhm has expanded the terms of socially engaged ways of working to an unprecedented scale and breadth by producing complex organizational, spatial, visual, and economic forms. These often entail the production of complex infrastructures, manifested via projects such as Culture is a Verb (2018-21), The Centre for Plausible Economies (2018-ongoing), Company: Movements, Deals and Drinks (2014-ongoing) and the Eco-Nomadic School (2010-ongoing). The book follows a major mid-career exhibition at The Showroom, London, in 2021.

Offering a significant addition to debates on contemporary art and architecture, social action, and public culture, Kathrin Böhm: Art on the Scale of Life brings together critical reflections by internationally acclaimed contributors. Spanning a wide range of critical positions and disciplines, these include Dave Beech, Céline Condorelli, Elvira Dyangani Ose, Wapke Feenstra, Katherine Gibson, Joon-Lynn Goh, Lily Hall, Yolande Zola Zoli van der Heide, Grace Ndiritu, Gerrie van Noord, Paul O’Neill, Doina Petrescu, Gregory Sholette and THEMM!!, Kuba Szreder, Gavin Wade, Mick Wilson, Stephen Wright, and Franciska Zólyom. In addition, material derived from Böhm’s international networks and projects provides an in-depth impression of the deeply ingrained collaborative and durational nature of her way of working.

Photographic, diagrammatic, and typographical imagery runs through the book, demonstrating the rich visual and spatial languages embedded in Böhm’s work. This visual register of the book is therefore much more than a series of illustrations and acts as a counterpoint to, and extension of, the ideas elaborated in the texts.

Copublished by HDK-Valand; PUBLICS; The Showroom

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