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Green's Art: New Media Aesthetics in Pre- and Post- Election Events in Iran

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Green's Art: New Media Aesthetics in Pre- and Post- Election Events in Iran GREEN’S ART: NEW MEDIA huge number of famous artists inside online information channels (through AESTHETICS IN PRE- AND and outside the country. In addition, using complicated filtering systems to POST- ELECTION EVENTS IN after the election a number of lesser- prevent the Internet from being used IRAN known and amateur artists joined the effectively by the public). During the Amin Ansari, Faculty of Education, protests. Along with street post-election period, when protesters Humanities and Law, Flinders demonstrations and protests, the volume were totally isolated by national radio University, Adelaide, Australia of artworks1 created by ordinary citizens and television, digital media played a Email: <[email protected]> and unknown artists rose markedly. particularly significant role in Created by all available means (such as circulating information, feelings and Abstract Photoshop, Windows Movie Maker and political expression within Iranian Digital media has played a very significant role in Microsoft Paint), these artworks were society. anti-government protests in the Middle East (in Iran, Egypt, Syria and so on) over the last four distributed to audiences via social Commentators on the role of digital years It has changed the rules of political struggle networks, email and other available media in Iran in the wake of the 2009 and established new expectations and rules of digital means. election could be categorized into three confrontation for both protesters and authoritarian governments in the region. The Greens’ Art The Greens’ Art project is a major groups. The first group research project will be a curated exhibition of combination of an online exhibition of enthusiastically believes that social digital art and other works developed during the pre- and post-election period (2009-11), situated artworks about both the Green media tools, such as Twitter and alongside participants’ accounts of the role of these Movement and anti-movement Facebook, played a vital role in the works in the grassroots Iranian Green Movement. responses, and a repository of related emergence and resistance of the Green materials, including interviews, Movement [8-11]. The second group is Keywords: Iran, Green Movement, Digital Media, Art, Protest, Iran, Artivism, Greens’ Art comments, and theoretical debates. This convinced that the effectiveness of paper addresses the background theories various social media tools is just an Introduction and ideas on the placement of art and illusion, and recognize people To explain briefly, the Iranian Green digital media in political affairs, and themselves as being the Green Movement refers to the grassroots discusses the role and significance of Movement’s main engine. They believe protests that arose after the presidential Greens’ Art, both as a current research that the government’s controls on election in 2009. These protests engaged project, and as a curated exhibition cyberspace and military reaction against different classes and layers of society, which aims to undertake a deeper and any kind of protest have reduced these spread quickly, and transformed into more comprehensive examination of the tools to information services [12-16]. one the most significant social and relationships between protest, art and The third reaction to the role of digital political movements of Iran’s digital media during the crisis period in media in political struggle is more contemporary history. According to the Iran. cautious and inconclusive, remaining evidence of street protest and ambivalent regarding the value of social turbulence, the Green Movement was New Media and the Green networking services such as Twitter [17- formed, peaked and declined over a two Movement 18]. year period from 2009 to 2011. The The world was totally surprised when Despite positive and negative period brought considerable turmoil, Iranians broadcast their news, photos opinions on the role of technologies and with militarized reactions of the and videos in the post-election period on digital media in the pre- and post- government to protests, along with the a huge scale. Who could believe that, election period, there is no doubt that death and imprisonment of a large despite the government’s control of new media tools were very effective in number of citizens. The Green cyber activities and its brutal reactions the creation and distribution of artworks. Movement has been defined and to cyber-protests, people would make Circulation of artistic materials through interpreted in a variety of ways. Some such an effort to report and show true social media and satellite channels commentators say that it has ‘died’ stories online? Undoubtedly, digital accelerated the emergence of sympathy whilst others insist that despite its media has been one of the most vital and solidarity among protesters at the temporary absence it is alive, and simply means for the Green Movement to beginning of the crisis. One of the looking for another chance to appear on achieve a voice. remarkable aspects of this phenomenon the streets. Some Iranian citizens see the The level of Iranians’ contribution to is the evidence of activists’ and ordinary Green Movement as a thing of the past, the digital arena during the period 2009- people’s capabilities in using digital while others still carry green elements 11 seems all the more remarkable when technologies, and the fact that they like wristbands. we compare it to the realities of the became audiences and producers of new Looking back to the pre-election regulated mass media and the media products. This phenomenon is in period, one sees that the campaign of the government’s ideological control of line with Benjamin’s essay ‘The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical reformist candidate Mirhossein Mousavi, called ‘the Green Wave’, 1 Reproduction’. As well as blurring the applied various artistic strategies in Categories: Documentary Videos, Clips, borders between author and public, promoting him; after the election was Animations, Short Movies, Long Movies, Benjamin argues that mechanical rigged, his campaign became the core of Paintings, Graffiti, Posters and Illustrations, reproduction changes the reaction of the the Green Movement, and engaged in Website Banners, Cartoons, General Drawings, masses toward art, and renders it Lyrics, Poems, Novels, Short Stories, Political further non-violent protests against the accessible for everyone: “At any Humors, Slogans, Music, Photos, Sculptures, results of the election, thereby gaining moment the reader is ready to turn into a Performing Arts, Costumes and Accessories. Mousavi widespread support from a writer” [4]. A version of this has Please reference as: [Author(s)-of-paper] (2013) [Title-of-paper] in Cleland, K., Fisher, L. & Harley, R. (Eds.) Proceedings of the 19th International Symposium of Electronic Art, ISEA2013, Sydney. http://ses.library.usyd.edu.au/handle/2123/9475 Page numbering begins at 1 at the start of the paper. happened in Iran, with many everyday (1963), the Islamic Revolution (1979) protests to overthrow the system. His citizens and users becoming citizen and the Green Movement (2009). The article ‘From They Rule to We Rule’ journalists and cultural producers. increasing centrality of religion since attempts to evaluate the role of artivism During the post-election period, 1979 provides a particularly clear in current political affairs; this essay is protesters used digital media not only as example. Immediately after the Islamic based on his previous creative project an information channel and a way of Revolution, the government established ‘They Rule’, which aimed to provide a organizing themselves, but as an artistic the Islamic Advertisement Organization, glimpse of some of the relationships outlet, a means of expression for people investing considerable effort (and the amongst the US ruling class. He also lacking freedom of political expression. capacities of the Ministry of Culture and asserts that artists have the same Islamic Guidance) in the control of political responsibilities as other Art and the Green Movement social, political and cultural matters members of society, and does not have As a socio-political movement, the through a variety of means, including extra expectations of them [6]. Green Movement’s relationship with art artistic. This idea can also be seen in Similarly, the widely-read yet can be considered within the broader what British-based Iranian media anonymous Mikhak website field of ‘politics and art’. This field lecturer Khiabany calls ‘Islamic commentator views the role of art in the includes a range of debates and Exceptionalism’, which along with ‘De- Green Movement’s progression more practices, from propaganda and political Westernizing’ make up “the pillars of pessimistically. In an article entitled art, through community and protest art, Islamism” [3]. ‘Aestheticization of Politics’, the author to ‘artivism’ - a combination of art and On the non-government side, there is argues that insisting on artivism reduces activism. Historically, there has been a considerable tradition of artivism, both the whole movement to a fruitless much debate about the connection on a worldwide scale and in Iran’s political act, and has transformed between politics and art. Many theorists, history. One approach is to ask how art serious political matters of death and life with a variety of points of view, have is functioning in the hands of protesters. into enjoyable entertainment. investigated why art deals with political Walter Benjamin
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