We projected with the Rainforest Action Network at the #CrystalPepsi launch party to call on PepsiCo to stop using ‪#‎ConflictPalmOil‬ in their products. Often produced using child labor and modern-day slavery, Conflict Palm Oil is now in nearly half of all packaged foods at US grocery stores. Its production is destroying rainforests and driving wildlife extinction in Southeast Asia. ‪See more at: ran.org/projection_action_nyc

For the Hemispheric Institute’s 2016 Encuentro eXcéntrico, The Illuminator collaborated with student activists in Santiago, Chile on the issue of student debt and the proposed educational reform. During two nights of urban intervention, we worked with students in the Confech, Deuda Educativa as well as technical institute students and anarchists, representing a broad spectrum of opinions on the complex situation. On the first night, we projected messages from the student movement, and then invited people to complete three sentences: “Student debt is…”, “There won’t be free education while…”, and “Education should be…” On the second night, we projected a video made by the Confech that explains the problems with the educational reform proposed by the government, and then invited passers by to add their voices to the discussion.

We believe that quality education is a right for all, and that educational debt is part of a larger system of neoliberal oppression, that together we will continue to fight. Thank you to all the students and people who helped us and collaborated with us on this project!

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En el 2016 Encuentro eXcéntrico del Instituto Hemisférico, The Illuminator colaboró con activistas estudiantiles en Santiago de Chile sobre el tema de la deuda educativa y la reforma del gobierno. Durante dos noches de intervención urbana, trabajabamos con los estudiantes de la Confech, Deuda Educativa, así como estudiantes de los institutos técnicos y anarquistas, que representan un amplio espectro de opiniones sobre la situación compleja. En la primera noche, proyectabamos mensajes del movimiento estudiantil, y luego invitabamos a la gente a completar tres frases: “La deuda educacional es …”, “No existirá educación gratuita mientras…”, y “La educación puede ser …”. En la segunda noche, proyectabamos un video hecho por la Confech que explica los problemas con la reforma educativa propuesta por el gobierno y, a continuación, invitabamos a los transeúntes a sumar sus voces a la discusión.

Creemos que la educación de calidad es un derecho para todxs, y que la deuda educativa es parte de un sistema opresivo neoliberal, que juntos vamos a seguir luchando. Gracias a todxs los estudiantes y las personas que nos ayudaron y colaboraron con nosotros en este proyecto!

In Santiago Chile, where The Illuminator traveled for the Hemispheric Encuentro 2016 (#hemienc2016), students are engaged in a prolonged battle with the government to live up to its promises for free and quality education for all. The crisis of student debt is a struggle for dignity in the face of ongoing neoliberal austerity in Chile.

We stand with our compañeros in FECH, FEUC, and Confech, who made this video, and who wrote the following:  

“‪#‎Quierootrareforma‬ - Illuminating Santiago for a New Education

An unannounced action carried out as the ‪#‎CONFECH‬ with #TheIlluminator on Wednesday night, we illuminated the University of Chile’s Faculty of Law building with the problems of the Chilean educational system and the proposals raised by students that have not been included in the government reform.

We want another reform, we want a free, quality, public education without profits or debts for studying!”

The Virus Divides

It Doesn’t Have To

No Walls Between Gay Men 

We projected with Avram Finkelstein and the Viral Divide Flash Collective at the Bronx Museum for the opening of the Art AIDS America exhibition.

On April 27th, The Illuminator rolled out with our allies in Gulf Labor to continue to call attention to the labor conditions at the Guggenheim Abu Dhabi construction project. Here is what GULF had to say about it:

“Tonight, the Global Ultra Luxury Faction (G.U.L.F.) used the walls of the Guggenheim Museum to send a clear message to the trustees of the Guggenheim Foundation. We also took the message to the building of the chairman of the board. A museum that seeks to profit from forced labor will be judged in public. The cynical marriage of ultra-luxury art and ultra-low wages is null and void.

The museum’s leaders broke trust by refusing further negotiations with the Gulf Labor Coalition over fair labor standards in Abu Dhabi. As they try to walk away from justice, who will hold them to account?

Every Day is May Day

A Storm is Blowing from Saadiyat Island”

Read More at http://hyperallergic.com/294500/protesters-shame-guggenheim-and-its-trustees-with-light-projections/

(Click on the photo above for slideshow)

On the April 19th 2016’s primary election an estimated 126,000 voters records were purged from the database in NYC.  People’s party affiliations were inexplicably changed, polling locations were moved without notification, many people’s names disappeared from the voting rosters altogether.  On top of these mishaps, around 3-million total New Yorkers weren’t able to vote at all because they weren’t registered as a Republican or Democrat and the deadline to do so was back in October (half a year before the actual primary vote!).  We believe that in a democracy, it should be easy for everyone to vote.  The individual vote is our primary means of democratic expression, is protected by the constitution, and the errors that occurred leading to tens of thousands of people’s votes being taken away should be investigated and the systems that broke down corrected immediately.  We demand that this never happen again!

On April 20th, the night after NY realized these atrocities, we joined a protest outside of the Brooklyn Bureau of Elections and demanded answers : WHERE ARE OUR VOTES?

http://www.thenation.com/…/new-york-had-the-second-lowest-…/

A video about this project is currently on display at the AgitProp! show in the Brooklyn Museum from April 7th-August 7th.

This series of interventions was inspired by the political mobilization and protests that took place at the Brooklyn Museum in November of 2015. The museum’s decision to rent its facilities to the Brooklyn Real Estate Summit- a strategy session for the developer class on how to maximize profits in the “red hot markets” of Brooklyn- caused an uproar in the surrounding neighborhoods, which are currently under siege by the forces of gentrification and displacement. In response, The Illuminator facilitated a process, in collaboration with the Crown Heights Tenant Union, through which neighborhood residents could directly and viscerally speak to the processes of displacement that they confront on a daily basis. In bearing witness to the violence of displacement as it occurs in this community, and remembering the sense of betrayal felt by many when the Brooklyn Real Estate Summit came into this building to discuss how to profit from this violence, we are left with a sincere, and as-yet unanswered, question: How can a museum be an ally to its community in its struggle for survival?

The Illuminator went to Paris for the COP21 climate talks, and shone on Le Pantheon as part of a massive mobilization for non-violent direct action on December 12th. More info: d12.paris/.