Art has always been about making a statement. Art in its pure form is an expression, a furthering of one’s self. To say that art should not be about making statements would be a contradiction of the medium itself. It can be used to make a political statement. And there are always artists who alter the course of art history by being provocative. Being an artist also means embodying your surroundings and expressing them, thus personifying your soul. Does it mean artists are aligned with activists, or is art another form of activism?

The occupation: Banksy is a world renowned, yet elusive, character who has shaken the corridors of power time and time again. Since his first visit to Palestine in 2003, he has created numerous art works in the public space that are a statement against the occupation of Palestine. Almost two kilometres from the centre of Bethlehem, overlooking the wall that stretches over 700 kilometres (twice the length of the Green Line) and separates Jerusalem, is a hotel operated by Banksy called the Walled Off Hotel which overlooks the separation barrier where roads require permits; you can’t travel on many if you hold Palestinian papers, and there are checkpoints throughout. His work over the years and the hotel itself is a strong, political statement against the oppression and the illegal military control.

The refugees: According to the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR), as of 2018, there were over 1.5 million refugees coming into Europe, of which at least 17,500 perished on the way. Ai Weiwei did a series of work about refugees which entailed sculptures, installations, mixed media and an award winning documentary. Law of the Journey, a 70-metre-long inflatable boat with 258 faceless refugees, was shown in Prague. Ever since he moved to Berlin in 2015, Weiwei has worked on several projects related to the plight of refugees, often meeting them personally. In the pursuit of humanising the statistics, life jackets left by the refugees at the shore were hung at the Konzerthaus, a concert hall in Vienna that has architectural significance from the 1600s.

The bullets: Four hundred and forty four people were killed in Karachi, and 444 gravestones were set up as an installation called Killing Fields of Karachi by Adeela Suleman at the Karachi Biennale to mark each death (the installation was shut down by the authorities). Every human deserves recognition, which is why governments issue identification and why we are given names and we have official documents to cross man-made state boundaries. For people to be wiped out and heaped into a corner, which is what the vandalism of the installation did, is a parallel to how these 444 people were treated. Suleman’s work may have been controversial, but so was Marcel Duchamp’s Fountain as was Pablo Picasso’s body of work. Her statement about the number of people through her art may have been unsettling, but so was M.F. Husain’s depiction of Hindu deities. 

On what could be art’s role versus what it is now, one has to dig a little deeper into the illusive and the elusive. It is about the essence of how you function in society, what you feel and what you want to express. Art has always been a statement. It always will be a statement, whether it is about an Edvard Munch painting, where a man looks like he is screaming, which art historians have said is about mental illness and the anguish of existence. What about the anguish of families who lost their loved ones? Political art is raw, unfiltered and stands at the illusive boundaries of truth-telling and liberation. 

Alia Chughtai is an interactive producer and designer.