Art and politics

There is nothing more political than a frank look at someone’s life. Where are they within society, the system, their family? How did they get there? How much agency did they have along the way? How do you perceive them, and how does your own place in society determine your perceptions?

How people understand and interact with reality always reflects on social and economic structures. Think of how a person’s relationship with their own body changes as their access to doctors changes. How their view of education is changed by that very education (which is always a reflection of culture, economy, and the accepted role of a citizen in their state). How their sense of agency changes as they interact with government officials, the police, and their neighbours.

Art is always political because what you think of as a worthy, interesting topic is, in part, influenced by your politics.

And art is always political because the assertion that a topic is apolitical is, itself, a political statement.

And we know that. We know art is political because we know art and artists are banned, jailed, burned. If your field is, or has ever been, subject to decency laws, censorship, and treason trials, then your field works within a legal system; nothing makes it onto the law books without passing through the political gristmill.

Your art is political. All art is political. To pretend otherwise is political. Stop pretending.