[Blake_Stimson,_Gregory_Sholette]_Collectivism_aft(z-lib
Do-It-Yourself Geopolitics 275produced under different names every time, its hands-on use of computertechnology, its nomadic sound systems for mounting concerts at any chosenlocation. It could be explored in the offshoots of mail art, with the developmentof fanzines, the Art Strike and Plagiarist movements, the Luther BlissettProject, the invention of radio- or telephone-assisted urban drifting. 5 Itcould be previewed in community-oriented video art, alternative TV projects,AIDS activism, and the theories of tactical media. But rather thanengaging in a preemptive archaeology of these developments, I want to godirectly to their most recent period of fruition in the late 1990s, when arekindled sense of social antagonism once again pushed aesthetic producers,along with many other social groups, into an overtly political confrontationwith norms and authorities.This time, the full range of media available for appropriation couldbe hooked into a world-spanning distribution machine: the Internet. ThespeciWc practices of computer hacking and the general model they proposedof amateur intervention into complex systems gave conWdence to a generationthat had not personally experienced the defeats and dead ends of the1960s. Building on this constructive possibility, an ambition arose to mapout the repressive and coercive order of the transnational corporations andinstitutions. It would be matched by attempts to disrupt that order throughthe construction of subversive situations on a global scale. Collective aestheticpractices, proliferating in social networks outside the institutionalspheres of art, were one of the major vectors for this double desire to graspand transform the new world map. A radically democratic desire that couldbe summed up in a seemingly impossible phrase: do-it-yourself geopolitics.J18, OR THE FINANCIAL CENTER NEAREST YOUDoes anyone know how it was really done? 6 The essence of cooperativelycatalyzed events is to defy single narratives. But it can be said that on June18, 1999 (J18), around noon, somewhere from Wve to ten thousand peopleXooded out of the tube lines at Liverpool station, right in the middle of theCity of London (Figure 10.1). Most found themselves holding a carnivalmask, in the colors black, green, red, or gold—the colors of anarchy, ecology,and communism, plus high Wnance, specially for the occasion. Amidthe chaos of echoing voices and pounding drums, it might even have beenpossible to read the texts on the back:Those in authority fear the mask for their power partly resides in identifying, stamping andcataloguing: in knowing who you are. But a Carnival needs masks, thousands of masks. . . .Masking up releases our commonality, enables us to act together. . . . During the last yearsthe power of money has presented a new mask over its criminal face. Disregarding borders,
276 Brian Holmeswith no importance given to race or colors, the power of money humiliates dignities,insults honesties and assassinates hopes.On the signal follow your color / Let the Carnival begin. 7The music was supposed to come from speakers carried in backpacks.But no one could hear it above the roar. Four groups divided anyway,not exactly according to color; one went off track and ended up at LondonBridge, to hold a party of its own. The others took separate paths throughthe medieval labyrinth of Europe’s largest Wnancial district, converging towarda point that had been announced only by word of mouth and kept secretfrom all but a few: the London International Financial Futures & OptionsExchange, or LIFFE building, the largest derivatives market in Europe—thepulsing, computerized, hypercompetitive brain of the beast. The trick wasto parade anarchically through the winding streets, swaying to the sambabands, inviting passing traders and bank employees to take off their ties orheels and join the party, while a few smaller groups rushed ahead, to dodgetremblingly into alleyways and await that precise moment when a numberof cars would inexplicably stop and begin blocking a stretch of Lower ThamesStreet. The sound system, of course, was already there. As protestors shooedstraggling motorists out of the area, larger groups began weaving in, hoistingpuppets to the rhythm of the music and waving red, black, and green Reclaimthe Streets (RTS) Xags in the air. The Carnival had begun, inside the “SquareMile” of London’s prestigious Wnancial district—and the police, taken entirelyby surprise, could do nothing about it.Banners went up: “our resistance is as global as capital,”“the earth is a common treasury for all,” “revolution is the onlyoption.” Posters by the French graphic arts group Ne Pas Plier (“do notfold”) were glued directly on the walls of banks, denouncing “money world,”proclaiming “resistance-existence,” or portraying the earth as a giant burgerwaiting to be consumed. The site had also been chosen for its undergroundecology: a long-buried stream runs below Dowgate Hill Street and CousinLane, right in front of the LIFFE building. A wall of cement and breezeblocks was built before the entrance to the exchange, while a Wre hydrantwas opened out in the street, projecting a spout of water thirty feet into theair and symbolically releasing the buried river from the historical sedimentationsof capital. The protestors danced beneath the torrent. In a historicalcenter of bourgeois discipline, inhibitions became very hard to Wnd. Thiswas a political party: a riotous event, in the Dionysian sense of the word.The quality of such urban uprisings is spontaneous, unpredictable,because everything depends on the cooperative expression of a multitudeof groups and individuals. Still these events can be nourished, chargedin advance with logical and imaginary resources. The six months preceding
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276 Brian Holmes
with no importance given to race or colors, the power of money humiliates dignities,
insults honesties and assassinates hopes.
On the signal follow your color / Let the Carnival begin. 7
The music was supposed to come from speakers carried in backpacks.
But no one could hear it above the roar. Four groups divided anyway,
not exactly according to color; one went off track and ended up at London
Bridge, to hold a party of its own. The others took separate paths through
the medieval labyrinth of Europe’s largest Wnancial district, converging toward
a point that had been announced only by word of mouth and kept secret
from all but a few: the London International Financial Futures & Options
Exchange, or LIFFE building, the largest derivatives market in Europe—the
pulsing, computerized, hypercompetitive brain of the beast. The trick was
to parade anarchically through the winding streets, swaying to the samba
bands, inviting passing traders and bank employees to take off their ties or
heels and join the party, while a few smaller groups rushed ahead, to dodge
tremblingly into alleyways and await that precise moment when a number
of cars would inexplicably stop and begin blocking a stretch of Lower Thames
Street. The sound system, of course, was already there. As protestors shooed
straggling motorists out of the area, larger groups began weaving in, hoisting
puppets to the rhythm of the music and waving red, black, and green Reclaim
the Streets (RTS) Xags in the air. The Carnival had begun, inside the “Square
Mile” of London’s prestigious Wnancial district—and the police, taken entirely
by surprise, could do nothing about it.
Banners went up: “our resistance is as global as capital,”
“the earth is a common treasury for all,” “revolution is the only
option.” Posters by the French graphic arts group Ne Pas Plier (“do not
fold”) were glued directly on the walls of banks, denouncing “money world,”
proclaiming “resistance-existence,” or portraying the earth as a giant burger
waiting to be consumed. The site had also been chosen for its underground
ecology: a long-buried stream runs below Dowgate Hill Street and Cousin
Lane, right in front of the LIFFE building. A wall of cement and breeze
blocks was built before the entrance to the exchange, while a Wre hydrant
was opened out in the street, projecting a spout of water thirty feet into the
air and symbolically releasing the buried river from the historical sedimentations
of capital. The protestors danced beneath the torrent. In a historical
center of bourgeois discipline, inhibitions became very hard to Wnd. This
was a political party: a riotous event, in the Dionysian sense of the word.
The quality of such urban uprisings is spontaneous, unpredictable,
because everything depends on the cooperative expression of a multitude
of groups and individuals. Still these events can be nourished, charged
in advance with logical and imaginary resources. The six months preceding