Artist's group urges restraint - Artworld - Artists' Network - Brief Article

Amid the early cries for retaliation after the WTC terrorist attack, other voices emerged that called for a more measured and tempered response. Those pleas ultimately went unheeded when the U.S. began military strikes on Oct. 7. Among the voices counseling restraint was the Artists' Network--whose members include Dread Scott, Pat Ward Williams and Renee Cox, along with individuals from the film, video, theater and dance communities--which began staging somber performances.

(The network is the arts wing of Refuse and Resist, a political activist group founded in 1987 by Abbie Hoffman and others.) The first event took place on Sept. 22 in Union Square, where over 100 artists dressed in black and wearing the dust masks that have become eerily familiar in lower Manhattan stood silently for an hour with signs that read "Our Grief is Not a Cry for War." Some onlookers were moved to tears, while others joined the performance, which received international press coverage. The action was repeated in Times Square on Sept. 25 and Oct. 5. Group members said they didn't want the WTC tragedy to be used as a justification for war or new restrictions on civil liberties. For information on the group's activities, visit its Web site at http://artistsnetwork.org.

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