Please join us at The Change You Want To See Gallery for a weekend of screenings, artist talks and workshops exploring the concept of exclusion as it pertains to voting and democracy. From Al Capone and Zombie movies, to knitting workshops and non-citizen voting projects, presenters include artists Cat Mazza, Ricardo Miranda, and Not An Alternative.
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Friday, October 10, 7:30pm – 9:30pm
The weekend kicks off with Vote Early, Vote Often, a multimedia presentation by Marco Deseriis and Jason Jones of Not An Alternative. Followed by a screening of Zombie film “Homecoming” (59min). American soldiers who died in Iraq come back to cast ballots in the US presidential elections.
Saturday, October 11, 12pm – 3pm
Cat Mazza, founder of the MicroRevolt collective of craftivistsm, will give an artist talk. A knitting workshop follows, participants are invited to bring works in progress, or contribute to the completion of Mazza’s latest project Stitch for Senate, in which knit helmet liners will be sent to Senators on election week 2008.
Sunday, October 12, 12pm – 3pm
Artist Ricardo Miranda Zuniga will discuss his latest work VOTEMOS.US ¡Mexico Decide!. Votemos.us is an online Spanish language portal that enables non-citizens to participate in the upcoming U.S. elections. On Sunday, it enters the physical world, as participants are invited to join Ricardo on the inaugural tour of the Votemos.us interactive voting cart.
HOMECOMING” IRAQ WAR ZOMBIE MOVIE
Just when things looked like they couldn't get any worse for President Bush, here come the zombies. In an election year, dead veterans of the current conflict crawl out of their graves and stagger single-mindedly to voting booths. They arrive courtesy of Joe Dante's Homecoming. One part satire of soulless Beltway insiders, one part gut-crunching horror flick, Homecoming kicks off when the flag-draped coffins of soldiers killed in Iraq burst open and the reanimated corpses of dead veterans hit the streets, searching for polling places where they can pull the lever for "anyone who will end this evil war." More than soldiers, the zombies represent all the disenfranchised, including those whose votes weren’t counted in both recent elections.
59min, Directed by Joe Dante (Gremlins, The Howling).
http://www.cinema-scope.com/cs25/int_peranson_dante.htm
CAT MAZZA: “STITCH FOR SENATE”
ARTIST TALK AND KNITTING WORKSHOP
Stitch for Senate is an initiative of knit hobbyists making helmet liners for every United States Senator. Building on the tradition of wartime knitting, a practice dating back to the American Revolution, Stitch for Senate revives this cultural trend by engaging with public officials about the war in Iraq. The Stitch for Senate website compiles testimonies from contributing knitters, that express everything from charity, allegiance, patriotism, resistance, and radicalism; using the tradition of political organizing within knitting circles as a space for storytelling, discussion, exchange and protest. Hobbyists knit in solidarity to persuade elected officials to support the troops by bringing them home. All the senators will receive their own helmet liner the week of the 2008 election, after being displayed in the seating chart of the US Senate at gallery venue. Once they are received, senators can opt to send helmets to a soldier.
http://www.stitchforsenate.us/
Cat Mazza (b. 1977 Washington DC) is an artist whose work combines traditional craft with digital media to explore the relationships between textiles, technology and labor. Recent exhibits include Hackers and Haute Couture Heretics at Garanti Gallery (Istanbul, Turkey) the Radical Lace and Subversive Knitting exhibit at the Museum of Arts and Design (New York City) and Miniartextil at Arte & Arte (Como, Italy). Mazza is a 2007 Re:New Media Arts Fellow in New Media and a 2008 Creative Capital grantee.
http://www.microrevolt.org/
RICARDO MIRANDA ZUNIGA: VOTEMOS.US ¡MEXICO DECIDE!
ARTIST TALK AND NEIGHBORHOOD PERFORMANCE
VOTEMOS.US ¡México Decide! is a Spanish language portal to the 2008 US presidential elections that proposes that Mexico get a vote in the US elections. Between Mexico and the United States exists a constant circulation of people, product and capital. Within the U.S. lives an active Mexican population that in 2000 represented 4% of the US labor force. If Mexico could elect the next U.S. president who would it be? Users can register, vote, and give their opinion on the U.S. elections.
On Sunday, October 12th, VOTEMOS.US will enter the physical world in the form of a voting cart by which participants may take the voice of either McCain or Obama as they make public a hypothetical vote for the 2008 U.S. Presidential Elections. The cart will feature hand-crafted wooden busts of McCain and Obama, each accompanied with a microphone for public use.
http://www.votemos.us
Ricardo Miranda Zúñiga approaches art as a social practice to establish dialogue in public spaces. As a child of immigrant parents and brought up in Nicaragua and San Francisco, Zúñiga’s awareness of inequality and discrimination was established at an early age. Themes such as immigration, discrimination, and the effects of globalization extend from highly subjective experiences and observations into works that tactfully engage others through populist metaphors while maintaining critical perspectives.
http://www.ambriente.com