SAW´s 2006 campaign: Land & Globalization
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The 2006 SAW posters are back from the printers! Help distribute the posters by ordering booklets online.
What is SAW?
Based in the U.S., SAW is a network of printmakers, stencil artists, graffiti writers and designers who use the streets for art and activism. We are taking back our cities and towns from the businessmen, cops and politicians who define public space for their own benefit. As a volunteer-run group, we make street art for political campaigns and post each other´s work across North America. Since 2001, our projects have talked about prisons (2002), the mass media (2003) and utopian ideas for the future (2004).
Our art is a creative tool for social change. We support community organizing by making and distributing high-profile publicity across North America.
We want to inspire people who have been attacked, oppressed or ignored by the rich and powerful -- communities of color, queers, women, seniors, the disabled and the working class.
We emphasize connections between communities and stand against all oppression including racism, sexism and homophobia. We oppose anti-Arab violence as well as anti-Jewish attacks in the U.S.
We want our art to be thought-provoking and politically radical but not simplistic or dogmatic. We want to push ourselves as individual artists and as group to make work that is creative, complex and emotional without being abstract or self-involved.
SAW was founded in March 2001. Every year our members pick a theme, make art, and put up each other´s work. We aim for the largest possible impact by posting art simultaneously across North America.
Most people in the network exchange posters, stencils or stickers designed for guerrilla wheat pasting or spray painting, but SAW submissions are limited only by your imagination.
Submissions need to be mass produced, easy to ship and relatively easy to display. Production costs are covered by each artist, and distribution costs are covered by SAW. The group is run by volunteers with a shoestring budget, but our collective strength promotes all of our work.