Occupy! Activate! Engage! The Politics of Visuality in Occupy Wall Street

This paper presents an analysis of the visuality of Occupy Wall Street arguing that visuality was a crucial tool for the success, mobilization and direction of the 2011 movement, and that studying this case study provides an example for the ways in which activism adapts to the digital age. The analysis focuses on a study of public space, graphic design, social media and performativity as elements of OWS’s visuality which inform, mobilize and direct the movement. Using the ideas of Rosalyn Deutsche, Joseph Beuys and the Situationist International the paper situates the movement within a dialogical framework which identifies the public as creative directors. This paper shows how OWS uses visuality as a means to disrupt hegemonic power structures and imbedded systems of control while activating counter publics and encouraging a fluid and multiplicitous use of public space