Focus on this artwork and discuss the History.
Hall and Moline developed the idea for the Overpass Light Brigade through their personal reactions to the movement to recall Governor Walker. They originally used a single panel and string of Christmas lights to create an illuminated "Recall Walker" sign, which they carried at a local rally. When images of the sign were circulated by mainstream media outlets including The Rachel Maddow Show and CNN, Hall and Moline decided to continue their efforts. Their next step was to create six individual signs that spelled "RECALL". After attempting to install the signs on the chainlink fence covering a pedestrian bridge across the Interstate (I-43) and learning that doing so is illegal, Hall and Moline enlisted others to help carry the signs as a legal form of display. This participatory dimension to the work gives Overpass Light Brigade gatherings "the feel of a celebration, with scores of people gathering on the pedestrian overpasses," according to the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel.For the artists, their work with the Overpass Light Brigade is a "demonstration of citizen engagement... a Situationist paradigm of performativity within the contested and liminal zones of public space" and a navigation of the tactics of visibility. They cite French critical theorist Guy Debord's  The Society of the Spectacle as an inspiration. Debord explored and explained how contemporary media creates spectacle that is essentially devoid of content. A founder of the artistic and political movement Situationist International, he sought, through the construction of "situations," to create multiple strategies for reclaiming an individual's self-determination from the sedative effects of ubiquitous spectacle.Hall and Moline had a history of making collaborative work, often about environmental issues and animal subjects, but rarely pushed beyond the boundaries of traditional art spaces. As a result of the Wisconsin protests, the artists became involved with activist work, in which the use of signs was pivotal. They also worked with other artists, activists, social scientists, and teachers to set up a short-lived political action committee called the Playground Legends, and began working in some of Milwaukee's African American communities on voter education and Get Out The Vote campaigns. The group, with the central notion that public space and public discourse were necessary for functional democracy, set up "parties in the parks" for neighborhood groups, and used these relational activities to help create cohesion around a political purpose.Brusky, a public school teacher and union organizer, became an integral part of the OLB core after live-streaming focused actions. He is credited with expanding the greater OLB community through his relationships with national Occupy networks.The OLB organization relies on a loose network of volunteers dedicated to "peaceful protest and artful activism."
Get Out The Vote voter education Guy Debord Christmas lights volunteers public discourse Situationist International The Rachel Maddow Show mainstream media public school Milwaukee Journal Sentinel public space Milwaukee union organizer The Society of the Spectacle Occupy teacher political action committee CNN chainlink fence live-streaming critical theorist Wisconsin Interstate (I-43)