Since 2019, Art Workers’ Inquiry has been developing methods for everyday art workers to speak openly on capitalism and colonialism in the art world.
Billy Anania
Billy Anania is an editor, critic, and journalist in New York City whose work focuses on political economy in the cultural industries and the history of art in global liberation movements.
Posted inArt
Sustainability as a Form of Resistance in Art
At NYU’s Latinx Project, a group exhibition explores how Latin, African, and Asian diaspora artists promote sustainability beyond borders.
Posted inFilm
Dora García Documents Networks of Feminist Survival in Mexico City
In two shorts showing as part of García’s exhibition at Amant, she explores the unfinished revolution of diplomat Alexandra Kollontai.
Posted inArt
Shedding Light on Homelessness Through Artistic Ingenuity
The unhoused can teach a masterclass on survival — and that we are all just one stroke of bad luck away from the same fate.
Posted inArt
The Problems and Pleasures of an Activist Art Exhibition
I am often skeptical of protest art behind glass, yet I still cannot deny the pleasure of experiencing politically charged artworks in a venue making the effort.
Posted inArt
Was Jacques-Louis David Really That Radical?
Rather than accentuating his radicalism, the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s new exhibition makes Jacques-Louis David a compelling case study in opportunism and survival.
Posted inArt
Revisiting Latin American Artists’ Struggle for Representation in the United States
While the 1965 Immigration Act opened the United States for expanded Latin American immigration, the decade that followed found migrant artists actively involved in political struggles for representation.
Posted inArt
Famakan Magassa’s Virtuous Vice
The Malian painter’s first solo exhibition in New York muses on the desires and compulsions that guide us toward enlightenment — and occasionally get us into trouble.
Posted inFilm
The Joyful Return of a Trans Icon and Electronic Music Pioneer
In the 36 years since recording the seminal Keyboard Fantasies, Beverly Glenn-Copeland has risen from elusive singer-songwriter to global phenomenon.
Posted inArt
Artists Are Embracing the Power of Refusal
Amid today’s rampant wealth consolidation and labor exploitation, contemporary art has shifted from bourgeois keepsake to active participant in the working-class struggle.
Posted inArt
The General Strike in Modern Art
A massive strike wave in the 19th and 20th centuries redefined how painters, illustrators, and photographers advocate for the working class.
Posted inArt
The Ancient Art of Organized Labor
From Egyptian craftsmen to European textile workers, artists have always found strength in numbers.