Art in America
May 2025
As a Gen Xer, I grew up with the mantra “think globally, act locally.” Today, however, the tsunami of antidemocratic and oligarchic actions inundating the United States and many other geographies is decidedly global, overwhelmingly so. The trickle-up potential that acting locally once promised has clearly failed.
To fight back, we will need a polyphony of divergent yet parallel efforts. This will require us to reinvent culture work, transforming it so that we might look closely at deeply held “truths,” even when they provide comfort, and at long-maintained methods and behaviors that no longer serve us.