…Exploring the role of the prankster as artist, activist and social observer and the significance of the prank in society.
Traveling into or out of the United States (and want to be able to travel without the fear of deportation)? Show the authorities that your online activity from the past five years has been pre-screened and approved.
Print your customizable Social Media Compliance Certificate, by artist Joey Skaggs, and keep it with your passport and other important travel documents.
https://joeyskaggs.com/works/social-media-compliance-certificate/.
It’s about time…
“Learn ‘How to Be a Guerrilla Girl’ at The Getty,” by Beverly Press, November 26, 2025.
Coinciding with the Guerrilla Girls’ 40th anniversary, “How to Be a Guerrilla Girl,” on view at the Getty through April 12, 2026, offers a rare, behind-the-scenes look into the inner workings of the iconic feminist art collective.
Drawing from the Getty Research Institute’s remarkable Guerrilla Girls archive, the exhibition highlights the strategies – anonymity, data gathering, protest actions, culture jamming and grassroots distribution – that have defined the group’s groundbreaking practice since the mid-1980s.
The Guerrilla Girls have created a newly-commissioned work for the exhibition that explores the Getty’s own collection of European painting and sculpture. Using comic strip style speech bubbles, they reimagine the voices of women represented in these artworks through a twenty-first century lens. The commission exposes deeply rooted biases in the representation of women in Guerilla Girls characteristic witty style. Read the whole article here.
“Art-dropping” gets easier.
“Prankster With a Cause Sneaks AI Artwork Into UK Museum ,” by Rhea Nayyar, Hyperallergic, November 12, 2025.
Artist Elias Marrow said he wanted to draw attention to rising hunger and poverty in the country.
An unsolicited digital print hung undetected for several hours on the walls of the National Museum Cardiff in Wales after it was installed by a conceptual artist in the museum’s contemporary art wing. Later revealed to be AI-generated, Elias Marrow’s “Empty Plate” (2024) bamboozled museum visitors and staff alike, as no one could explain its presence.
The print emulates an oil portrait of a nondescript young boy in a school uniform, holding a bare plate on his lap with a dour expression. Per the artist’s website, “It is unclear whether [the boy] waits to be fed, punished, or simply forgotten.” While the subject appears to have the correct number of fingers, other aspects of the painting, including the jumbled alphabet on his uniform logo and the overall yellowish tinge to the work, are undeniable evidence of generative AI — though Marrow’s accompanying wall text does not mention it. Read the whole article here.
Using the power of humor and satire to de-escalate confrontations.
“Why people are really wearing silly costumes at protests against Trump,” by The Conversation, AlterNet, October 24, 2025.
Three frogs, a shark, a unicorn and a Tyrannosaurus rex dance in front of a line of heavily armoured police in riot gear.
Over the past few weeks, activists taking part in protests against Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) across the United States have donned inflatable animal costumes. The aim is to disrupt the Trump administration’s claim that the protests are violent “hate America” rallies.
The result is a sight to behold, with many encounters between police and protestors going viral.
Whether they know it or not, these costumed activists are contributing to a rich history of using humour and dress to mobilise against and challenge power. Read the whole article here.
The upcoming scrotum exhibition will probably be cancelled as well.
“School Nixes Exhibition Criticized by Turning Point USA,” by Isa Farfan, Hyperallergic, October 16, 2025.
The Fletcher Exhibit of political art was hosted at East Tennessee State University for 11 years until it came under attack from right-wing figures.
A long-running art exhibition of political artwork at East Tennessee State University (ETSU) was not invited to return to the school this year after a wave of right-wing backlash, including from a Tennessee chapter of Turning Point USA.
The Fletcher Exhibit of Social and Politically Engaged Art, held annually at ETSU’s Reece Museum since 2013, came under intense scrutiny from conservatives during and after the November 2024 presidential election. The show has been organized by the family of Fletcher Dyer, who was an art student at ETSU when he died in a tragic accident in 2009, for over a decade.