Political Pranks - The Art of the Prank

February 28, 2025

A Sign of the Times

The writing’s on the wall and the bus stop…

The Street Artist Behind the Viral “Anti-Elon Musk” Ads, by Rhea Nayyar, Hyperallergic, February 24, 2025

Winston Tseng’s satirical ad falsely attributed to USAID at a bike dock in Washington, DC, elicited frenzied responses from Republican Senator Thom Tillis.

Street artist Winston Tseng was behind an anti-Elon Musk ad that led to a viral frenzy when it was installed in various sidewalk ad spaces within a mile of the White House two weeks ago. The ad, satirically attributed to the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), read “Help Eliminate Elon” and featured a large red X crossing over an illustration of Musk doing the Nazi salute.

“In the spirit of transparency, I should disclose that USAID paid me $69M (in condoms) for this ad,” Tseng said in an email to Hyperallergic, riffing on Musk’s misunderstanding of the US’s provisions for international HIV prevention and treatment.

Free Biden Presidential Pardons Are Here!

Print your own customizable and frameable Joseph R. Biden Presidential Pardon, by artist Joey Skaggs, here: https://joeyskaggs.com/biden-presidential-pardon/.

If you’d prefer a free Trump Presidential Pardon, it’s here: https://joeyskaggs.com/trump-presidential-pardon/.

September 14, 2024September 19, 2024

See Spot Run. Run Spot Run!

30 years ago, I perpetrated a media hoax called Dog Meat Soup in which, pretending to be a Korean entrepreneur, I solicited dog shelters for their unwanted dogs to be used as food for human consumption. My intent was to expose hostility and racism that permeates both the public discourse and the media’s coverage. As I expected, all hell broke loose, as gullible animal lovers spewed outrageous invectives against ALL Asians (they apparently couldn’t tell the difference between Koreans, Japanese, Chinese and others) accusing them of outrageous acts of violence against animals and telling all Asians to go back to their countries and cook their own babies.

This cultural intolerance is eerily like what’s happening now based on fake information perpetrated by politicians with an agenda, targeting immigrants and accusing them of eating family pets in Springfield Ohio. Prejudiced and biased opinions about this are dominating our news and social media platforms. Let’s not be fooled by reactionary politicians who have a political agenda to confuse and divide the public.

Check out John Tierney’s 1994 expose of the Dog Meat Soup hoax for The New York Sunday Times Magazine.

And watch the Dog Meat Soup segment of a 2003 ABC TV 20/20 interview.

September 2, 2024

Seeding Activism

From a tiny joke to a mighty oak…

Wall-to-Wall Walz at the Minnesota State Fair Seed Art Show, Isabella Segalovich, Hyperallergic, August 30, 2024

Local artists get political in painstakingly crafted mosaics at the only state fair crop art display in the United States.

FALCON HEIGHTS, Minnesota — From a rotating gallery of butter sculptures to a hall bursting with quilts and embroidery, the annual Minnesota State Fair is always awash with creative endeavors. But the line is always the longest at the crop art display, the only one of its kind at a state fair in the United States. Here, fairgoers crowd shoulder-to-shoulder, sipping honey-infused lemonade from the nearby beekeeping room as they inspect hundreds of painstakingly crafted mosaics made entirely out of Minnesota-grown seeds. And more than any other art on the fairgrounds, this richly nutty art form is often explicitly and proudly political. Click here for more.