The 50 Most Political Art Pieces of the Past 15 Years

All art is political in the sense that it engages society in some way, either influencing or influenced by it. But some works speak more directly to concerns relating to human rights, corruption, the distribution of class, wealth or power—not every artist is moved by beauty. At times, these more political works are lacking of the awareness of political directives but cause a stir. Or perhaps a work is directly aimed at a political cause, an endorsement, or message. Then again, the medium or risk of a particular artwork can be political as well, directly or subversively. If this all sounds convoluted, it is—but that’s indicative of this culturally confusing time we live in. Not to worry. We’ve parsed out The 50 Most Political Art Pieces of the Past 10 Years from our favorite artist-activists. Paint is power!

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French painter Jules De Balincourt has a way of balancing the biting with the blasé, fusing prismatic folk art with social commentary in a way that keeps both extremely palatable. His 2003 New York show Land of Many Uses consisted of 57 paintings in varying mediums that were aggressively political, but avoided being off-putting simply through the playful nature of their compositions, making contemplation of political themes—such as how we perceive the world through the way we draw our maps or the idea of "Peaceful Protest" as shown above—an easy, intellectual joy.

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The title of the work, Capitalism Works for Me!, isn't cryptic at first glance. In fact it seems rather direct. The piece is constructed of a huge LED lit sign blaring the words of its title flanked by scoreboards that register "True" or "False" responses from audience members. The artwork however, lies more with the audience, who have to parse what capitalism means for themselves. The project was first announced by Steve Lambert on Kickstarter in 2011, and since its creation Lambert has taken Capitalism Works for Me! around to several cities in the United States. On Steve Lambert's Vimeo site you can find several videos of "interviewees" in the bind of voting not for any proposition or political shift, but just one of awareness.

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Walead Beshty's photographs lay bare the politics of travel in a post-9/11 world. His abstract photogram-like color fields are created by running large format negatives through the x-ray machines at various airports throughout the course of his travels. The machines irradiate the negative and in some literally expose the film. However, the exposures are uncontrollable and unpredictable; color and composition are not in the hands of Beshty, but rather in no hands at all. Instead, the penetrating invisible forces of the technology used to scan, investigate and examine our bodies and luggage from the inside out become the creators. Beshty's interaction (and dare say, collaboration) with the x-ray machines inspired a closer look at the effects of exchange: of goods, of hands, of space, and of import.

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Photographer Vik Muniz was born to a working-class family in Sao Paolo, Brasil in 1961. As a young man, he was shot in the leg, and subsequently given monetary compensation for his injury. Muniz used this money to make his way to New York City where he continues to live today. Over the course of Muniz's artistic career, he has continued to use unconventional materials (like sugar, chocolate sauce, diamonds or peanut butter and jelly) to create portraits and well-known photographs, but with new layers of meaning created from the symbolic doubling of the materials used to render the image. This three year project was aptly named, the Pictures of Junk series; as they were images created by the amalgamation and careful arrangement of urban detritus. But, it is worth mentioning that these works were not only credited just to Muniz but also to the catadores of Brasil's Jardim Gramacho, the informal workforce that scavenges the landfills for reusable materials. Muniz's hope was that his work at the Jardim Gramacho would not only bring awareness to the plight of these individuals, but also expose the catadores to the possibility of beauty within the junk. Their collaboration and Muniz's two-year stay in Brasil was documented by Lucy Walker's film Waste Land released in October 2010.

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In a number of actions surrounding the 2010 Winter Olympics in Vancouver, British Columbia, the group of artists known as White Pillows Collective made quick commentary of the games. Among the public performance works that stood out were Chun Hua Catherine Dong's Salute to the Game and Heidi Nagtegaal's Re-directing Traffic. In the former, Dong, dressed in military fatigues, walked through the Olympics' red zone and saluted to the Olympic logo wherever she saw it displayed. Security at some point became concerned; Dong told them she had always wanted to be in the army but was too small. For Nagtegaal's work, the artist engaged with imperialist tourism. She simply redirected traffic bound for the games to a relatively abandoned area of the city, without any information as to how to return.

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As a continuing part of the Danish collective, SUPERFLEX's exploration of the international financial crisis, they bring you: Power Toilets. The project began in 2004 with a commission from the Dutch DRFTWD office associates, and what became was a close collaboration between SUPERFLEX and NEZU AYMO architects. These two thoughtful and creative forces later completed a working replica of the restroom of United Nations Security Council headquarters in New York, which they installed in Park van Luna in Heerhugowaard, the Netherlands. SUPERFLEX's continuing project has also made its way to the Olympic Restaurant in New York City. Both Power Toilets are open for public use and confront an unsuspecting audience with an unassuming politicized space. The Power Toilets brings up questions regarding the façade of neutrality that these benign places present and the possible coded and overlooked political statements that they hold within them.

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Randy Kennedy's August 2012 article for the New York Times sums up the work in its title: "Making Art Out of November's Election." Beginning in September, New York artist Jonathan Horowitz's expansive work, Your Land/My Land: Election '12 was assembled at contemporary art museums across the United States including the Hammer Museum in Los Angeles, the Contemporary Art Museum in Raleigh, NC, the Contemporary Arts Museum in Houston, TX, the New Museum in Manhattan, as well as a handful of other institutions. Each museum housed a space designed by Horowitz; the sparsely decorated spaces were halved by red and blue area rugs, and only gave off a hint of the patriotism that election-time celebration decor is usually associated with. The divided spaces, reflecting America's color-coded political and cultural divide, are equipped with back-to-back television monitors that hover at the thresholds of red and blue. One monitor airs a live feed of Fox News, while the other broadcasts CNN, and portraits of the Democratic and Republican presidential candidates are mounted safely within their chromatically/politically designated area. Some institutions like the Hammer Museum opened their doors to the public for events such as the presidential and vice-presidential debates as well as election night itself.

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Yuren has become one of the most controversial and respected artists of the new millenium, as part of the collective that works in Beijing's Section 8 colony. At times, he's completed art so controversial—transforming the White Box into a site of demolition—there's not much information on what actually transpired. in The Sparks Program, however, it was clear that Yuren had assembled seven laborers in a dark room, to strike a pile of flint with metal rods, creating flashes of light and sound. It was meant as a commentary on the isolation of the Chinese construction worker during Beijing's real estate boom. Yuren was incarcerated in 2010 for organizing a protest of the closure of Section 8.

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In a 2012 article for Harper's Bazaar, Laura Brown describes the 2005 incident that drove Bolin to create the work he is known for today: "Liu Bolin watched as the artists' village in Beijing where he worked was demolished by the Chinese government. In protest... he painted himself into the wreckage of the artist's studios." Liu goes on to say 'It is very difficult for Chinese artists to earn their living; we are all martyrs of art.' Bolin's art career is a course of poetic tragedy; one born from violent destruction and inspired by bulldozed rubble. Perhaps that is why Liu's Bulldozer is particularly affective. Liu painted himself into the machine of his artistic birth and demise. Better yet, Liu has become one with the cause of his greatest trauma. And while his other photographic works focus on Chinese landscapes and monuments or issues of globalization and commodity, Bulldozer remains particularly powerful because of its ties to Liu's own experiences as a contemporary artist in China.

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Seub's violent photographic tableaux deal with the corruption of Korean society casr in dark humor. His series Who Wants To Live Forever engages material greed and economic conditions as the cause of and endpoint of human rights violations. Seub takes imagery from the biblical to the modern, fusing each piece with a well of cultural clashes.

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Fortunately or unfortunately, this is not just another presidential portrait. Firstly, most presidential visages don't make their rounds through cultural circuits like us (at Complex), High Snobiety, and Hybebeast. Secondly, and perhaps most obviously, the last 43 POTUSes didn't hang with guys like Terry Richardson, emphasizing the growing association between the President of the United States and mass media. President Obama continues to differ from his predecessors in the way that he connects to American youth through the image circuit; whether it is through the iconic 2008 HOPE portrait from Shepherd Fairey or through these photographs from Terry Richardson.

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Artist Robbie Conal has been creating provocative guerrilla poster campaigns since the Reagan Era. His latest work concentrates on 2012 presidential candidate Mitt Romney. Conal renders Romney cross-eyed with a heavily furrowed brow. His "pensive" expression looks just plain constipated. Floating above the caricature's head is an empty thought bubble, ready to be filled by an opinionated passerby. Conal confesses, "It's a minor form of civil disobedience," and a rather joyful one at that. The posters are pasted so sparingly in some areas that they become singular artworks themselves as they acquire Sharpied opinions on their surfaces or as they degrade over time. In other places, they become placards for varying opinions stretching across communities. Either way, Conal has still devised an artful and engaging way for the 2012 public to dig their fingers into the art of politics in the city streets.

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While on assignment for Atlantic, photographer Jill Greenberg decided to play with political fire. She was asked to photograph then presidential candidate John McCain for the cover of Atlantic, which she agreed to do. The photographs for the cover shot were taken without much fuss or difficulty; however, it was what came after the official shoot that inspired controversy. As the story goes, Greenberg finished the photographs needed for the cover then "lured" McCain over for another set, which was purposefully lit to be unflattering. But the plot thickens: Greenberg then took these additional images back to her studio and altered them further with Photoshop. Some of the images were lightly retouched. Others featured McCain with a monstrous and bloodied mouth or a chimpanzee defecating on his head. Greenberg makes her opinions of the politician known with text such as, "I AM A BLOODTHIRSTY WARMONGERER" and "IT WAS REALLY FUN TO CHEAT ON MY CAR-INJURY-DISABLED FIRST WIFE" plastered above McCain's head. Work similar to these portraits were featured Greenberg's video work, Entitled, in Katherine Cone Gallery's exhibition Legitimate Rape: Political Art in 2012.

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In 1984, the world's worst industrial disaster occurred when a leak at the Dow-owned Union Carbide pesticide plant exposed more than half a million people to dangerous chemicals. Between 3,000 and 10,000 people died because of the incident. The Yes Men, the name of culture jamming group founded by Jacques Servin and Igor Vamos, with a nebula of other actors and supporters, have long sought to bring attention to corruption, cover-up, and scandal through a process they describe as "Identity correction." Others would just call this imposture or fraud. That's what happened in December of 2004, on the 20th anniversary of the Bhopal Disaster, when Andy Bichlbaum appeared on the BBC, posing as a Dow Chemical executive. He told his interviewer that Dow planned to liquidate the Union Carbide plant and use the $12 billion in profit to compensate victims of the disaster.

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Harris has created site-specific installations that speak to environmentalism and waste, fashioning plastic sheeting and garbage bags into animal forms. The creatures only take shape when provided with a gust of air—Harris installs his sculptures above the ventilation grates of subways. While he works with waste storage products and depends on the very movement of mass transit, Harris forces one to think about the effect that urban life and its run-off has on environments removed from daily purview.

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Fred Tommaselli has been making visual art for decades now, using a number of gestures and media not typical to high art—he frequently employs prescription pills, psychedelic mushrooms, psychoactive plant leaves, paint, flowers photocollage, and resin as the fundamental materials in his work, at times making his paintings illegal and therefore subversive just in their existence. Big Raven, a centrifugal painting of his 2010-2011 mid-period retrospective at the Brooklyn Museum, is one of these, drawing from typically American folk art motifs while inverting issues of perception—the drugs are figurative without ingestion.

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Meckseper's work has consistently engaged identity with commodity. In this piece, the German-born artist equates the CDU and CSU—the initials of two opposing political parties in Germany—to baubles around the necks of two nearly identical women. The point here is that identifying with any political contingent is simply a signifier of capital allegiance—these women have purchased ideology, and they aren't any different from each other for having sought out subtly distinctive brands.

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This work of political commentary comes from Pakistani artist, Imran Qureshi, who proffers a rather humanistic reaction to the violence he has encountered in his own life. Just last month, Qureshi debuted his first large-scale installation in the United States on the Metropolitan Museum of Art's rooftop. Splatters of rich red paint sprawl across the 8,000 square foot concrete surface, and upon first glance resemble blood spatter. But with a little bit a patience, petals, feathers, vines and wings begin to appear. Qureshi's formal training in the tradition of miniature painting formally weaves together the disparate splashes and pools of paint, and makes the work not about violence as an end, but rather as Ken Johnson of the New York Times puts it: "From death grows life; from horror comes transcendence; hope emerges from despair."

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Photographer Alec Soth does a supremely articulate job at describing his 2008 series The Last Days of W that we decided to give you his introduction: "Having done so much work focused on America, I figured I ought to finally make my Big Political Commentary before—as W. says—the past is over. But during these last days of the administration, what is the point of protest, satire, or any other sort of rabble-rousing? Like the mother in Nebraska and just about every other American, mostly I feel worn out. So in assembling this collection of pictures, I suppose I'm not really trying to accomplish much at all. Rather, as President Bush himself once said, 'One of the great things about book is, sometimes there are some fantastic pictures.'"

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In Pittsburgh in 2010, a duo of artists came together to create a service-industry public installation with a sticking point: Dawn Weleski and Jon Rubin would open a take-out food stand, but they would only serve cuisine from nations that the United States is in conflict with. With each iteration, they change the facade of the Conflict Kitchen to match the nation. But it's not just food that brings diversity to Central Pittsburgh. The Conflict Kitchen has hosted discussions of culture and nationality, using Skype to hold dinner parties with U.S. nationals to engage in expanding a international understanding. The Conflict Kitchen is still open and is currently serving Iranian food.

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William Powhida's graphite drawing commissioned by the Brooklyn Rail for the cover of its November 2009 issue reminded art world elite and groupies alike that satirical illustrations can still have their bite. Powhida proffered some unfettered criticism of the museum's cronyism, alongside caricatures of a number of internationally recognized artists (like "Howdy Doody Jeff Koons"), curators (like Massimiliano Gioni), trustees, and the museum director herself, Lisa Phillips. So, for all those wondering what institutional critique looks like...

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Tino Sehgal's 2010, This Progress is a game changer, a full-fledged different model of art-making, art-working, art-experiencing and art-selling. The paradigm shift has been building velocity over the last century (or two), so an ostensibly complete de-materialization of an art-object comes as a surprise, but not an unexpected one. This Progress ran at the well-regarded Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum in New York City where visitors were greeted by the building's iconic and unusually naked atrium, speckled only with, not paintings or sculptures, but guides, or "interpreters" as Sehgal calls them. The interpreters relayed guests up the spiraling ramp. Each leg of the journey, interpreters asked the audience questions related to ideas of progress. The first portion began with a child interpreter, followed by a teenager, and then an adult, with the work culminating in a conversation with an older person. All visitors to the work agreed neither take photographs, nor record the work. As one participant said, "What happened on the ramps stayed on the ramps." However, the most shocking part about this work is not necessarily the mode of its performance, but the way in which it is sold. There are no written instructions for the work, no receipt of exchange and no pictures, just a conversation and a handshake with the buyer.

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This political piece of clothing both asks questions and makes statements simultaneously, but then most of Lisa Anne Auerbach's sweaters sets do just that. Her work typically manifests itself in knitted works that reflect her own personal opinions on political and personal issues. Do Ask, Do Tell, Auerbach's 2010 work continues on that same trajectory, but unlike most of her works, this particular piece is a scarf. The scarf's reading "Do Ask, Do Tell" simultaneously activates the wearer of the scarf as an open listener and asks of viewers of the scarf to speak for themselves. The "obvious reference," Auerbach mentions in a Huffington Post interview, "is the policy on gays serving openly in the US military," but she also mentions that, "the text can also be read as a proclamation about openness in general. " Auerbach's scarf is a conversation unto itself, even before interaction from a wearer. Auerbach made multiple scarves for purchase at the Hammer Museum gift shop in 2010.

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Theaster Gates has quickly risen through the ranks of the art world for his provocative work. In late 2012 he won a prize for Art and Politics from the New School and has become a favorite of none-other than Beyonce Knowles. Gates confronts problems glossed-over by the passage of time and the lack of this generation's cultural memory. This theme is particularly striking in his 2011 collection In The Event of a Race Riot. Somehow ending up with many decommissioned fire hoses, Gates coiled them and placed them in gilt-frame shadow boxes. It is a direct reference to the hosing of peaceful protesters in Birmingham, Albama in 1963. The frames lodge the struggles of that era in an untouchable time but are clearly put there on our own insistence.

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The sculpture created by anonymous artist D.H., in 2011, was dedicated to the people of Calgary as a "lasting monument to the suffering of all humankind and to our unceasing desire to overcome." The premise of the sculpture is without a doubt daunting, but the grand statement calling for a healed and unified humankind is not out of step within the context of the Occupy movement. The swirling abstract sculpture was the final vestige of the Occupy Calgary encampment that had rooted itself in the plaza for 55 days in late 2011. And while the sculpture was easy to removal, the effects of Occupy in Calgary were not carted away so easily.

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Barbara Kruger is not unfamiliar with the vast audience of public artwork. Precedents for this type of work stretch back to 1983, beginning with her participation with the Public Art Fund in New York City to her contribution to the ongoing project Message to the Public on the Spectacolor Board in Times Square. In 1991, she created a bus shelter poster series. Kruger also carried out a similar project in 1997 in New York City, similar to her 2012 Art Matters project in Los Angeles, but the subject matter was totally different in nature. This project goes straight to the core of an issue close to Kruger's heart: arts education. The UCLA professor has been quoted as saying "The place of the arts in the classroom is essential in encouraging invention, ambition, and an understanding of the importance and pleasures of living an examined life." Kruger's confrontational phrases address Los Angeles' public head on, asking them to among other things, to "SUPPORT PUBLIC EDUCATION OR FACE CATASTROPHE."

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As they say on their website, Guerrilla Girls are reinventing the "F" word... Feminism! This band of outspoken ladie has created a number of incredible works to advance awareness about women. In an interview with The Huffington Post last year, two members described their election season work featuring Michelle Bachmann: "We have a pro-same sex marriage billboard in Minneapolis in which Michelle Bachmann in an election rally made the proclamation that everyone had the same civil rights. When she was questioned as to whether gay people could get married she said, 'Yes, they have the same civil rights as everyone else... To get married to someone of the opposite sex.' So we used part of that statement along with an equal sign on her lips." The billboard is no feat or innovation of graphic design or appropriation, but it does get people talking about the political figures at hand, the issues they handle, and the manner in which they handle them. But from buzz surrounding the billboard's contents and their makers, its obvious that the American population has a very long way to go.

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Franic Alÿs caused a slight stir in Mexico City in 2001 when legally bought a Beretta at a gun shop. He left the shop with the gun in hand and began walking the streets with the firearm visibly displayed, a camera following him. After 11 minutes of aimless walking and whistling, Alÿs was stopped by police and arrested, despite his legal acquisition of the gun—he was eventually released. The very next day, the artist convinced the police to recreate the series of event and filmed the re-enactment. The two versions are shown side-by-side, raising questions of power, the knowledge of power, and the limitations of the individual's rights to mobilize.

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Ofili's work is significant for the lawsuit it spurred against the Brooklyn Museum, brought by the easily offended Mayor of New York at that time, Rudolph Giuliani. Ofili's painted a black Virgin Mary, deemed "disgusting" by Giuliani—it was composed in part of elephant dung, which was inspired by the time Ofili spent in Zimbabwe. It also used clips of pornography, using close up cut-outs of women's genitalia to represent butterflies. At the very least, this painting raised questions about the politics of medium. Perhaps it was the collision of the sacred with the profane that so many found so uncouth. The painting was eventually damaged by an offended Catholic named Dennis Heiner, who smeared white paint over the canvas. He was given a $250 fine.

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Jitish Kallat's site-specific installation was embedded in the Art Institute of Chicago's Grand Staircase. The work, Public Notice 3 interweaves two pivotal historical moments: the first Parliament of the World's Religions, which opened on September 11, 1893 and took place in the museum, and the attacks on the World Trade Center on the same day 108 years later. Kallat brings together two disparate moments, one of immense celebration and unity, the other of painful tragedy, through the words spoken by the Indian Hindu monk Swami Vivekananda at the first Parliament of the World's Religion. Over a century ago, Vivekananda spoke in front of a crowd of 7,000 people spanning all faiths, and called for universalism and tolerance. His speech was met with a standing ovation and hailed as a turning point of the event. The site adjacent to Vivekananda's initial oration houses Kallat's third Public Notice work, and the words of his powerful speech slowly ticked across the 118 stairs in the colors of the Homeland Security alert system (red, orange, yellow, blue and green) from September 11, 2010 to January 2, 2011.

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Video artist and 2013 Creative Capital grant awardee, Laurie Jo Reynolds has taken it upon herself to do what some people may consider impossible: to achieve "concrete policy change... using an arts and culture approach to cultural organizing." Today, most political works only say things, and few do much of anything other than momentarily impact viewers. Reynolds' work centers around conditions in prisons and practices such as solitary confinement that engage in "fear-based criminal justice policies." In addition to being one of 14 Soros Justice Fellows, Reynolds is the chief coordinator of the group Tamms Year Ten, a successful grassroots campaign to close the Tamms supermax prison in Illinois. Her work is not just something provocative to hang above a rich person's couch but is instead making a real difference in legislative policy and people's lives. The photograph above is one of the mud-stenciling campaigns organized by Reynolds and carried out by Tamms Year Ten and number of local artists.

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Famed Chinese artist Ai Weiwei's former assistant is making a name of his own. The thirty-something year old artist has created a number of videos and sculptures that reflect on his experiences as an artist in China. His ongoing series entitled Happenings is found on the internet mostly in the form of video stills of Zhao's being bloodied by someone on the street. The title recalls the whimsical Happenings produced by Allan Kaprow in the 1960s. However it is Zhao's broken officer sculpture that gained him wider notoriety as an artist in his own right. Zhao's work resembles the ruins of a monumental sculpture of a police officer. The broken pieces of an ostensibly whole statue wears a badge whose corresponded with the date of Weiwei's incarceration in 2011. Customs police confiscated the sculpture, when on its way to New York for an exhibition, deeming it "not art." Following this news, Zhao was also told he would have to pay a fine of 300,000 yuan (approximately $48,000) for an unnamed reason. Though the loss of the work is regrettable, its absorption into the cultural Chinese abyss only proves the premise of the sculptural work.

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In an age of unlimited and instantaneous communication, we're apt to take the First Amendment for granted, particularly that part about a free press. But in 2010, a group of Brooklyn artists, printers, and activists took the limits of that provision to a logical end. A crew at the single-page newspaper Showpaper commandeered 12 street-style newspaper boxes. Then, Brooklyn artist Andrew Shirley commissioned a group of street artists to paint them, goading the infamous street artist Adam Cost out of retirement. After that, the boxes were dropped around the city to distribute the free paper. Though some of them were stolen or disappeared in minutes, many still remain on the streets, filled by volunteers each week with copies of Showpaper. While the entire project reaffirmed the agency of the individual in the right to free expression, it also became a public artwork of illuminating proportion. "I've always thought of graffiti as a tattoo on the skin of the city," Charlie Ahearn, director of the NYC graffiti opus Wild Style, told me at a 2010 showing of all 12 boxes. "But these, these are something more important. When you think about newspaper boxes, they are things that don't belong on the street to begin with. These ones in particular are special-more like artistic barnacles on the surface of the city."

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Palestinian artist Emily Jacir was dubbed an "archivist, activist, and poet" by the board that awarded her the 2008 Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation's Hugo Boss Prize. Being notable at just one of the roles attributed to Jacir would be a worthwhile achievement, but her multimedia storytelling does fulfill her lofty praise. Her work explores the daily life of Palestinian communities and toggles between focusing on mundane details and critical historical events. This particular work, Materials for a film (performance), was realized (first at the 2006 Biennale of Sydney) as two installation spaces that address the assassination of Palestinian intellectual Wael Zuaiter in Rome by Israeli secret service in October 1972. The work was meant as a memorial to Zuaiter's "thwarted aspirations" and a "memorial to untold stories. To that which has not been translated. To stories that will never be written." One room contains photographs of the pages perforated by the bullet that killed Zuaiter, the other contains shelves of innumerable blank books shot with the same type of gun used on Zuaiter in 1972. In Material for a film, Jacir delves into the fallen intellectual's personal effects to create another intimate portrait.

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Nothing screams "political" quite like absolution. After a long legal battle with her former gallerist, Bellmore, one of Canada's more active and prominent artists, staged her exit from the art world in a gloriously commentative way. She showed up outside the Vancouver Art Gallery, scrubbed the sidewalk there, unfurled a bedspread of human hair, laid on it under a sign that read "I am worth more than $1 million to my people," then stood up and shouted, "I quit." The gallery had been trying to sue her for $1 million for four years.

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With the fall of the Soviet Union came a loss of ideals, hope, and stability. Photographer Mikhailov set out to capture the effects of the economic collapse of the USSR on those left on the streets in Kharkov. The resulting images are chilling and rich, documenting a sub-working class left out in the cold by a bifurcated economic gap. Because of the luxury that had sprung up in the city's center, the divide between there and the destitute outskirts was never as shockingly highlighted as in Mikhailov's work. "The rich and the homeless-the new classes of a new society-this was, as we had been taught, one of the features of capitalism," reads the show's introduction. The series first showed in the U.S. at the Museum of Modern Art in 2011, a moment primed for the divisive commentary, following a stateside economic collapse.

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Lebanese-born artist Walid Raad is the founder of the Atlas Group. But the Atlas Group, is actually a fictional collective made up of only one member: Walid Raad. His works for the Atlas Group include photography and video as well as written components. The collective was created in order to research and document contemporary Lebanese history, and the materials of the group are usually presented through lectures including film, photography, video and installation. The materials generated by Raad are meant to establish an alternative perspective to mainstream history that often conflates fiction with fact. His 2009 installation at the Reina Sofia in Madrid consisted of a collection of many of his works created over the span of the 15-years, which is coincidentally the duration of the Lebanese Civil War as well as the life of the Atlas Group. One example of work (titled, My Neck is Thinner Than a Hair: Engines) features 100 photographs taken at scenes where various extremist groups detonated car bombs during the country's Civil War.

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Protests erupted in central Istanbul after Turkish authorities violently herded out and arrested thousand of peaceful protesters from a small park. After citizens around the globe witnessed the event through pictures and other various social media platforms, a number of occupations (reminiscent of that of Occupy Wall Street) cropped up internationally, in solidarity with those who set up camp in Gezi Park. This particular event is not strictly considered a political artwork, but it would be a shame to exclude something as phenomenal as political agency at a place like the hallowed Venice Biennale. During the Biennale, art world elite gather to examine the international sphere of art, and it sometimes seems that amidst this pristine bubble of aesthetic contemplation is a complete lack of awareness of current events. Solidarity demonstrations such as these stand as reminder that the art-goers and aesthetes still have an undeniable social and political consciousness.

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French artist street artist JR's piece Face2Face is a part of his continuing Inside Out Project (stemming from the artist's vow to 'Use art to turn the world Inside Out'). This particular installment, Time is Now, Yalla! draws on the commonalities between the divided populaces of Israel and Palestine. The title itself jump-starts the cultural bridge with the word "Yalla"—an Arabic word used by both Israelis and Palestinians to mean "let's go." JR and his team set up four photo booths in four cities: Bethlehem and Ramallah (in Palestine) and Tel Aviv and Haifa (in Israel). Palestinians and Israelis are invited to visit the photo booths, and for the price of a personal statement, the visitor receives a large-format portrait that they can paste anywhere they wish. The artist said of his work: 'Everyone can tell a story through art, and the time is now to listen to break down barriers to expression and give people the tools to be seen and heard.'

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At least according to the photos of the enigmatic artist's 2005 trip to the wall between Israel and Palestine, Banksy's painting of the divide between the embattled nations was both risky and risque. As the unnamed graffiti-prankster-provocateur put up windows to idyllic paradises and a ladder that went up and over the barricade, fatigued guards stood watch with assault rifles. Never content or politically satisfied with displaying his works through a gallery system, Banksy's vandalism reached a subversive apex at the top of the wall. The nine pieces he put up were implicitly political simply because of where they were located and more actively for the sense of constructivism they elicited.

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In a work that was banned from exhibition in both Belgium and Poland, Czech artist David Cerny created an image of Saddam Hussein bound and suspended in formaldehyde. Beyond the actively political suppression of the work, because, as one Belgian mayor said, "that certain population groups would find the work too provocative," Cerny's piece raises questions of how history is perceived. Do we simply let the cultural narrative write itself? Do the victors always get the last word? Is the toppling of tyranny frozen in stasis? In terms of Saddam's narrative in the West, history appears to be the history of domination. He's preserved and yet still captive and in dialogue with the audience. The was piece was in direct response to the 1991 Damien Hirst work The Physical Impossibility of Death in the Mind of Someone Living.

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Though it might be argued this work is simply political by subtext, there's no mistaking the two-toned image above the word HOPE that became synonymous with the historic election of Barack Obama. It was eventually adopted officially by his campaign. Fairey's work in street art had been vaguely political at least figuratively up to that point, but his naivete in the endorsement of the then-democratic senator from Illinois verged on the propaganda, or perhaps that was the point. Though the AP has claimed rights to the image, it is known the world over, appearing on T-Shirts and magnets and lunch boxes and tattoos and action figures as Obama's election swept the globe—abundantly merchandised, typical of pretty much every Shepard Fairey work.

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We want to believe the legal battle Fairey undertook with the Associated Press in the years following the use of their photo for his Obama portrait was meant as a work unto itself. The AP claimed that Fairey had taken a photograph licensed by the news agency and unduly misappropriated it. Fairey’s defense became more convoluted as time went on, at first saying he hadn’t stolen the photo, then eventually claiming his use of the photo fell under fair use. Was this all a political statement? Why else would Fairey perjure himself, tamper with evidence, submit false documents, and then ultimately plead guilty to infringement, if not to raise questions about copyright issues? Fairey was eventually sentenced to probation and a $25,000 fine.

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Last year, Pussy Riot, a Russian feminist protest group, made international headlines after their 40 second performance that explicitly exposed their derision towards the relationship between Russian President Vladimir Putin's regime and the Russian Orthodox Church. The protest that took place at Moscow's Christ the Saviour Cathedral has left people around the world fixated on the aftermath. The initial "artwork" itself, the 40 seconds of open protest, led to a two year sentence for three of the women performing that day: Yekaterina Samutsevich, Nadzdha Tolokonnikova and Maria Alekhina. The work has unexpectedly expanded in it's duration and global reach of awareness. As of May 22, after a decision made by a Russian judge regarding the case, Alehkina has declared a hunger strike. The "artwork" itself has unexpectedly expanded in it's duration and global span.

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Before Pussy Riot was Pussy Riot, they were members of the Russian performance art troupe called Voina. Among a handful of politically-driven public works and performances, their protest of the 2008 election of President Dmitry Medvedev stands out as perhaps the most subversive. This action took place in the Moscow Biological Museum, near a stuffed bear. Five couples undressed and had sex in the hall. It was first covered by a few bloggers and photographers but gained significant media attention following the arrest of Pussy Riot. One of the participants, Alexei Plutser-Sarno, described it not as radical but simply honest. "This is a portrait of pre-election Russia: everybody fucks each other, and the puppy bear," their nickname for Medvedev, "looks at that with an unconcealed scorn," Pluster-Sarno said of the work.

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Everyone's favorite art patron, Mitt Romney, shared in a 2012 interview with Fortune magazine, that he planned to shrink eliminate "the subsidy for the National Endowment for the Arts." In response, Los Angeles-based artist SABER created monumental aerial graffiti in the New York City sky in autumn of 2012. The artist hired several skywriting planes to scatter phrases such as "Defend the arts," "Occupy Wall Street," and "Graffiti" above the city's skyline for all to see. After the recognition of his aerial work, SABER was quoted as saying, that the extremely Conservative Right "has no appreciation for the arts or American culture, despite the fact that creative people are the backbone of this country." While SABER's scornful remarks regarding extreme Right wing conservatives' supposed sentiments are rather unproductive, his demand to have "creative people" be recognized as the "backbone of this country" prove to be a much more provocative and generative notion. And in an interview with Frank 151 last year, SABER mentioned the potential for his aerial graffiti to be expanded into a multi-city campaign.

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The art world—nay the whole world—was stunned when images leaked of paintings done by former President George W. Bush earlier this year. Apparently, a hacker found his way across the paintings in Bush family emails and released them to the Web. Of the most remarkable are two self-portraits featuring Bush in the bathtub and shower. Though on first glance the paintings seem amateurish, they were almost universally critically received. Jerry Saltz at New York Magazine said they "border on the visionary, the absurd, the perverse, the frat boy." The fact Bush signs his paintings "43," referring to his lineage in the presidency, stamps these as remarkably self-aware, yet impossibly outsider. The imagery points to issues of transparency, privacy, and the ritual of cleansing. In an interview with Diane Sawyer on the matter, the president said that painting "changed my life." Perhaps if he had taken up the arts during his presidency he wouldn't have advocated for tax cuts that eliminated funding for a significant number of humanities programs.

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Cecilia Gimenez's restoration of the 19th century fresco in the Santuario de Misericordia Church in the town of Borja, Spain is revelatory of a whole vein of politics usually overlooked when viewing art—the politics of conversation and restoration. The New York Daily News reported last year, that "there were fears when Cecilia Gimenez... marched, brush and oil paint in hand... and daubed over Elias Garcia Martinez's Ecce Homo (Behold the Man) without permission." Ironically, Gimenez's botched "restoration" may have given (the satirically renamed) Ecce Mono (meaning "Behold the Monkey"), its global recognition. But beside the pathetic humor accompanying the "restoration," the publicity also drew attention to city itself, as well as the growing conflict between priorities: tourist revenue or historical restoration? Global recognition or local history?

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In 2008, a 7.9 magnitude earthquake hit Sichuan, China, leading to the collapse of a number of schools and the deaths of thousands of children. The exact number of students that perished during the quake was never released. That didn't stop Chinese dissident artist Ai Weiwei from launching his own investigation into the shoddy workmanship of the schools, due to lax governmental regulations—at least 9,000 children died. At first, Ai Weiwei simply posted the names of the dead on his infamously radical blog. He later reprised the piece as part of a retrospective called So Sorry, referring to the rote apologies governments, corporations, and other large, publicly complicit bodies give to stave off any responsibility in the wake of disaster. A year later, he created the public installation Remembering, on the facade of Munich's Haus der Kunst. The work was comprised of nine thousand backpacks, spelling out the phrase, "She lived happily for seven years in this world" in Chinese characters. It was a quote from the mother of one of the children who died. "The lives of the students disappeared within the state propaganda, and very soon everybody will forget everything," Ai Weiwei said of the project.

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Artist Wafaa Bilal's 2010 work ...and Counting confronts a number of emotionally powerful issues in one gesture of bodily submission. In 2004, Bilal's brother was killed by a missile at checkpoint in their hometown of Kufa, Iraq. His brother's tragic death charged this performance with a authentic vulnerability, both emotionally and physically for Bilal. For 24 hours, Bilal allows his own body to become "a borderless map of Iraq covered with one dot for each Iraqi and American casualty near the cities where they fell." The deaths of 5,000 Americans were represented by red dots, while the 100,000 Iraqi casualties are represented by dots of green UV, invisible unless viewed under a black-light.

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