What Arts-Based Tool & Tactics

are Emerging to Meeting the MAGA Storm?

This is the Arts Freedom weather report for February 11, 2026. In this episode you'll hear how

1. Artists across the country are turning public space into sites of creative resistance
2. Why local place based cultural responses in cities like New York, Los Angeles, Minneapolis and beyond are becoming frontline laboratories for cultural democratic practice
3. And how innovative artist led networks and cultural organizers are teaching resistance as a craft.

NOTABLE MENTIONS

People

Bill Cleveland

Host of ART IS CHANGE and founder of the Center for the Study of Art & Community.

Renee Macklin Goode

Minneapolis poet and community member whose killing sparked mass protest, mourning, and cultural resistance. (Minnesota Public Radio)

Nadya Tolokonnikova

Artist and founding member of Pussy Riot; creator of Police State, referenced in connection with durational performance responding to ICE raids and militarization. (Museum of Modern Art)

Daniel C. Walker

Artist whose work G Is for Genocide appeared in the New York exhibition Don’t Look: A Defense of Free Expression.

Khan Nguyen Hong Gu

Artist whose Miami Beach window installation protesting Gaza was removed; cited as an example of censorship pressure. (Artforum)

Madeline Drunot

Denver-based artist whose Little Saigon project became a flashpoint for debate over representation and censorship.

Organizations, Networks & Initiatives

Center for the Study of Art & Community

Producing organization for ART IS CHANGE.

Fall of Freedom Initiative

Grassroots cultural protest effort coordinating hundreds of creative resistance actions nationwide.

NYC Resistance Salon

Artist-led network using digital billboards and public installations for political dissent.

Banned Book Brigade

Activist effort highlighting censorship through public performance and visual protest. (PEN America contextual resource)

New York Public Library

Site of Banned Book Brigade actions and symbolic defense of intellectual freedom.

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