Does it Work?: The Æffect of Activist Art

Starting with the questions: Does it Work? and How Can We Know? this article explores the effect and affect, or affect, of activist art. Rejecting a singular definition of how activist art is supposed to work and drawing from the actual practices of activist artists, a range of possible aims is offered and then organized around four primary goals. A methodology, which accounts for the indeterminacy of art and the reality of unintended consequences, is provided as a heuristic tool with which to think through the efficacy of activist art and the development of a metrics appropriate to the practice.