Soapbox Event

SOAPBOX EVENTS HISTORY

The first event was in April 5th, 2008, at Federal Hall National Memorial New York City. It was curated by Sandra Skurvida and project manager was Janine Slaker. This event was funded by Lower Manhattan Cultural Council September 11th Fund.

Past events include: in collaboration with CREATIVE TIME/DEMOCRACY IN AMERICA exhibition curated by Nato Thompson at the PARK AVENUE ARMORY, New York City; Speaker's Stone at Galleri Eleverket, Finland, curated by Magdalena Holm; and Creative Time's exhibition "Speech Acts from Democracy in America, The National Campaign" at University of Michigan Art Gallery, with curator Amanda Krugliak.

THANKS TO ALL PARTICIPATING INSTITUTIONS, VOLUNTEERS AND OTHER INVOLVED GOOD PEOPLE!

Federal Hall National Memorial

The site — formerly New York City Hall

and Customs House, currently Federal

Hall National Memorial — epitomizes

freedom of speech in America. In this place,

newspaperman John Peter Zenger was

tried for seditious libel against the Royal

Governor; with his 1735 acquittal winning

a major victory for the free press in America;

George Washington delivered his inaugural

presidential speech from the balcony in

1790; and Yayoi Kusama held her Naked

Event on the steps in 1969. We are pleased

to present Soapbox Event amid this splendid

tradition of speech acts.

OLD QUOTES OF THE WEEK

The Swedish Supreme Administrative Court ruled on 18 June that the IP addresses are personal data in a case regarding APB (the Swedish Anti-Piracy Bureau, Antipiratbyrån), a lobby group representing copyright owners.

However, from the comments following the judgement, it became clear that this ruling will not stop the implementation of the Swedish IPRED Directive or the way the copyright holder representatives record and keep IP addresses in order to identify alleged file-shares. Although the ruling means that APB's methods for chasing filesharers by logging their IP addresses was in violation of the Personal Data Act, the new IPRED law changed the situation.

"As the father of four children, I am absolutely appalled that taxpayer dollars are being used to spread President Obama's socialist ideology,"
Greer CNN Politics.com, September 4 2009

Talarstenen Puhujakivi Speaker's Stone

Säg vad du vill i Ekenäs!
Puhu suusi puhtaaksi Tammisaaressa!
Speak your mind in Ekenäs!

View recorded speeches and comments:
Talarstenen Puhujakivi Speaker's Stone

LOCATION:
Galleri Elverket
Gustaf Wasas gata 11, Ekenäs, Finland

This installation was active from 5th of February to 15th of March 2009: You will still find the stone in the courtyard next to Galleri Elverket. Previously, you heard a bull and by that, knew you had arrived. However, now, look under the blue lamp.

This project was part of Pia Lindman's retrospective at Galleri Elverket 5.2 - 15.3 2009 and funded in part by Pro Artibus, Finland
For more info visit Pro Artibus or check the blog Talarstenen

Old quotes of the week

Never before have I felt so shamed for being a citizen of the Nordic countries, historically a haven for democracy, justice, emancipation, and honesty. I must've been fooled all along. Pre-emptive arrests, breakdown of civil society, barring accredited participants from talks? Shame on the Danish Government, shame on the Danish Police, shame shame shame!

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/12/16/protests-in-copenhagen-de_n_393784.html

http://www.democracynow.org/2009/12/16/climate_crackdown_un_bars_friends_of

Pia Lindman
Thursday 12/17/09

The Skip Gates arrest
is really a bit depressing for me to read about :-((
When i was a teenager I wasnt aware of the term 'racial profiling' but I understood the phenomena PERSONALLY.
As a 17-year old at "the Cooper Union for the Advancement of Arts and Science"(yeah thats its full "proper" name) starting my student career as an architect I remember the humiliation when police surrounded me on MacDougal street in the West Village after a "neighbor" telephoned them that a BLACK MAN was needed to be stopped from what ever he was doing.
Yes that was ME. Looking at the various examples of what we have as colonial townhouse architecture from "New Amsterdam'. No I wasnt even trying to even GET in these places. I was always on the public sidewalk.
I remember this more than 25 years later because it has made me less willing (ie: "FEARFUL") of allowing my normal/natural/human curiosity to grasp aspects of the world around me.
This in general means (to this day) I can hardly look at things in comfort and not think that there will be someone on some telephone calling the police.
I looooong ago stopped browsing inside of Department stores (after the relentless security guards walking behind me).
Even the security guards at the Supermarkets here in Berlin make ME nervous because of these experiences even though I am no longer in the USA-I am now irrationally "programmed'.
I can also remember waiting for my young brother to return from camping. I waited on a door stoop on the Upper Eastside and was about to be arrested for prostitution. I explained , naive that I am, why I was waiting-but was told this was irrelevent and that I should leave or be arrested.
All of these leave still a bitter taste in my memory because I realize that I have often been 1 millimeter away from being thrown into a prison system just for being ME. It gives me no "real" sense of personal safety. Let's say I just dont have the same freedom as a snoopy white granny (I'll never forget seeing two well dressed white-grannies stealing chocolate in a chic shop in the Marais-Paris and thinking to myself that I would have been the one the shop keepers would fear)

Jean Ulrick Desért, 23rd of July 2009

A certain excess which was kept under check in previous history, is in capitalism elevated into the very principle of social life, in the speculative movement of money begetting more money. And, perhaps it is only today, in global capitalism in its “postindustrial”, digitalized form, that existing capitalism is reaching the level of its notion: perhaps one should follow Marx’s old, antievolutionist motto that the anatomy of man provides the key for the anatomy of the monkey.

paraphrazed from Slavoj Zizek, 17/06/09 in La Communitat Inconfessable

[In New York] Bloomberg controls public advertising and the commercial press - and the police have the assignment of making "peaceable gathering" impossible - but they can't stop people from meeting each other and sharing opinions in public space. We can still do that. We can find each other. The cops were always a step behind us yesterday
Billy Talen 05/13 2009

But my experience with that is that if you look at the abolitionists, the suffragists, the labor movement, civil rights movement, in the end, the change always happens when good people break bad laws and accept the consequences, that some people actually have to engage the law through the grassroots movements of nonviolence.
Father John Dear, Anti-Nuclear Activist

Democracy is not an absence of disagreement; it gets its virtue from its love of dissent
Spinoza rephrased by artist group Freee

A true exercise in democracy. If only the opinion of every individual could be considered on a national scale, on every major issue, in the form of daily referendums.This would be active democracy - the evolutionary progression of representative democracy. Theoretically impractical? With the advancement of modern computer technologies this should not seem so unreasonable
sarpedonia on October 29 2008

Democracy is 2 wolves and a sheep voting on what's for dinner
Don Shappelle at 2:10pm September 29 2009

Created by: OnlineITDegree.net

First day of Democracy in America, The National Campaign at the Park Avenue Armory NYC

Soapbox Event opened again with Democracy in America, The National Campaign exhibit at the Park Avenue Armory, NYC this Sunday 09/21/08. We kept the boxes going from 11AM to 10PM!!

This was an energizing day with many interested and interesting minds, works, and speeches coming together. Thank you Nato Thompson, for this bold, much needed, smart, inspiring, and fun show! Thanks to Creative Time for taking on this risky and bold endeavor. Thanks also to all the enthused and helpful volunteers!

Personal thanks to Soapbox Production Manager Janine Slaker and Speaker Agent Loren Allston, who stuck it out all day long. You gave me strength.

At the bottom of this page I have uploaded recordings of the speeches: check out The Missile Dick Chicks video below for something hilariously burlesque and the unplugged off-the-cuff Victor Sheely.

You still have a chance to participate! Welcome to the Soapbox Event next Friday and Saturday (09/26 from 12 to 3PM and 09/27 from 3PM to 6PM) at Park Avenue Armory!

Scroll down to the bottom of this page to find more videos.

Please post comments and speeches, and check in again.

Pia Lindman

Soapbox Event

SOAPBOX EVENTS HISTORY

Soapbox Event/Creative Time Photos

LINK TO THE DEMOCRACY IN AMERICA EXHIBITION:

Federal Hall National Memorial

Obama delivers speech at Federal Hall National Memorial 09/14/09 from The Talk Radio News Service

Workshops

INTERESTING LINKS

QUOTE OF THE WEEK

Move your money/It's a wonderful life mix

A SAD DAY FOR DEMOCRACY

OLD QUOTES OF THE WEEK

Talarstenen Puhujakivi Speaker's Stone

Old quotes of the week

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/12/16/protests-in-copenhagen-de_n_393784.html

http://www.democracynow.org/2009/12/16/climate_crackdown_un_bars_friends_of

Occupy Wall Street

Soapbox Event/Federal Hall Documentation PART 1

Soapbox Event/Federal Hall Documentation Part 2

Soapbox Event/Federal Hall Documentation Part 4

Soapbox Event/Federal Hall Documentation Part 5

Soapbox Event/Federal Hall Documentation, part 3

Soapbox Event/Federal Hall Documentation Part 6

Missile Dick Chicks on Soapboxes/Creative Time

About race, voting, and nature

Leeza Meksin on SPANDEX leggings

Poem about love

4/6/12

Political debating like watching superbowl

empowerment of public speech

Accentuate the Postitive

Inspiration for art and political action and Raging Grannies

Soapbox Event/Creative Time and financial crisis

Soapbox Event/Creative Time Political Art in the Margins

Victor Sheely on Soapbox Event/Creative Time

First day of Democracy in America, The National Campaign at the Park Avenue Armory NYC

Protest against Soapbox rules!/Creative Time

Soapbox Event/Creative Time Documentation Part 6

Soapbox Event/Creative Time Documentation Part 3

NUMBER OF VISITS