Visual Art Campaigns

Abstract

This chapter looks at visual art campaigns, especially in the context of arts-based research with an interest in public engagement. Art campaigns happen at the crossroads of art and activism. Sometimes artists can purposely work from an activist point of view; sometimes a political aspect emerges unintentionally. This chapter will first give an overview of different campaigns using visual methods. It then presents a brief description of the development of art from modernism to the contemporary forms of artistic expressions; this leads to the examples of different art campaigns. The chapter then discusses the potential of contemporary art in challenging the assumptions of modernism through the examples of author’s own artistic and EcoJustice practice. The chapter also describes the possibilities of promoting a cause in various fields of art, academia, and the general public, and it ends with a discussion of the benefits and challenges of being an independent artist/scholar with an interest in public engagement.