A fishnet-covered woman’s leg glowed softly over the construction site as former Philly bike messenger Stewart Ebersole reflected on propaganda. This could hardly be the recipe for anything other than an art show. The woman’s leg was a lamp at Rex’s Bar and the construction was the Renegade Art Coalition living up to their DIY (do-it-yourself) philosophy – drilling into walls to mount the posters which constitute their current show and building a perch for a projector for the eighth of the Renegade Art Projects. The coalition grew partly from Ebersole’s nostalgia for a running show he frequented while living in Philadelphia. He described the show as “art without pretense” and the people as genuine – more of a scene than just a show. But this area lacked similar venues. The coalition formed several years ago, informally at first, just to toss around “retarded art ideas” and figure out if they were possible. Their first endeavor was High Fashion Friday, an effort to get what Ebersole described as “dirty rock’n’roll kids” to show up Friday night in formal wear. The atmosphere was “almost debilitating,” he said and he wanted to lighten the mood. HFF lasted for about two and a half months, and by the end of it, about forty to fifty kids were consistently showing up in suits and gowns. With one band, it stuck. Pilot Round the Sun, which briefly reunited for Project Eight, consistently wore business suits to perform.
From there, Ebersole and friends constructed a show in his house, moving out the furniture and taking it with art, music and film. The projects quickly outgrew Ebersole’s house and shifted into the basic format they have today.
Every show has a theme, which Ebersole chooses. From there, the coalition sends out a call to artists they’ve worked with before. After that, the artists can recommend others, and finally the coalition sends out an open call through their e-mail mailing list. Interested parties can sign up to be on the list at a show or at www.renegade-art-coalition.com. The artists complete and submit their work, usually about one or two pieces on the given theme, and the coalition selects complementing bands and films. It sounds pretty straightforward but when asked to go into detail, Vanessa Holwitt, coalition member, started reeling off a head-spinning list of tasks involving media contact, promotional design and logistics, managing artists, finding space. When you consider this isn’t a paying gig (most shows, they just break even), it represents a massive labor of love.
The current show is themed “Propaganda.” Ebersole described himself as very interested – not to say obsessed – in visceral advertisement, the industry reaching to the lowest-common-denominator emotions and the advent of modern poster propaganda. So for this show, the artists were asked to design their interpretation of propaganda but with one catch: it had to promote the Renegade Art Coalition and include the words, “Renegade art must prevail.” Ebersole discussed the relationship between propaganda and advertising, sometimes making such distinctions as “Propaganda is hyper-advertising” but sometimes equating the two. It’s primarily the purposes which are different – advertising sells you material things; propaganda sells you ideology. The creation of purposefully shameless propaganda called attention to what propaganda is and how it works on people. Propaganda and advertising both have the power to make people want something they might not even really want; with the endless options these days, many choices are made, often unconsciously, on the basis of the packaging at hand.
This “propaganda” is unusual in that it functions literally as hype for Renegade Art; but it also sells their ideology – punk rock inspired, DIY, at least a little rebellious, a little subversive. This combination of results isn’t surprising, considering that thought-provoking aspects aside, Ebersole designed his multi-platform shows around the idea that people don’t want to sit around too long; they have short attention spans. They want quick visual input and entertainment. It certainly makes for a good show, with a little bit of everything – and this collaboration of practical and ideological, along with the dedication of the coalition, pack a lot of punch into Ebersole and Co.’s “art project.