In this interview, the author and Australian artist Jemima Wyman discuss the position of art and activism in Wyman's artistic practice. Focusing on opacity as a political position in the conception and production of her artwork, Wyman comments on her use of patterns, performance, and collaborative interventions as well as the feminist and activist legacies that inform her video, performance, and installation works. For Wyman, opacity and camouflage enable collective emancipatory action in a time of contemporary neoliberal forms of surveillance, as seen in the practices of Pussy Riot members in Russia, the Zapatista Army of National Liberation in Chiapas, Mexico, and the global hacktivist group Anonymous. Drawing on global protest movements as well as debates in the history of art, Wyman offers her thoughts on how visual opacity and collective actions obfuscate as well as activate political resistance in her artwork.

opacity, performance art, camouflage, resistance, art and activism
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© 2016 by Camera Obscura
2016
Issue Section:
In Practice: Opacities
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