What began on September 17th in Manhattan’s Financial District Liberty Square as a single protest against the massive bank bailouts known as Occupy Wall Street, spanned out worldwide. The initial movement was dismissed by much of the media. As people took notice of the message “We are the 99%” and sympathized with the message, protests grew, and the media finally took notice.

The Occupy Wall Street movement “is a leaderless resistance movement with people of many colors, genders and political persuasions.” It’s believed among those that make the 99% that the dealings of the 1% should be challenged. It is a people’s message that has morphed into a social movement.

This exhibit focuses on the message through the artistic expressions of the people who use simple placards to express their message, discontent, and perhaps their hope.  The old adage that “Art is political,” is relevant in this movement.  Whether as an unintended consequence, the truth is this is a movement of activists moved by social inequality to commentary. This exhibit focuses on the art that reflects a social movement of the Occupy Movements. 

This is a display of selected images. I encourage the viewer to go online to http://occuprint.org or http://occupyposters.tumblr.com  and see the images created by many talented artists. View the messages that too often are lost in the rhetoric of opposition and ideology. The display includes three artists that the CHC has previously hosted – Xico González, Melanie Cervántes, and Jesús Barraza – talented artists who are influenced by activist artists that documented the Chicano Movement and who have held faculty positions on various university campuses throughout the United States.