#BlackoutTuesday, Malevich and some thoughts on virtue signalling (part 1)
Due to its sheer size, lack of clarity and ultimate counter-productivity, the phenomenon of #BlackoutTuesday feels emblematic of performative activism in the Black Lives Matter revival of 2020 and beyond. The hashtag snowballed out of an initiative called #TheShowMustBePaused, a protest founded by music executives Jamila Thomas and Brianna Agyemang, as an attempt to demand accountability and progress within the music industry. Over the course of June 2nd, 2020, posts of black squares accompanied by the hashtag #BlackoutTuesday were shared by huge corporations, celebrities and individuals alike, spreading across Instagram like wildfire until ‘the gesture [came to eclipse] its original specific intent’. (Coscarelli, 2020)
When removed completely from the context of its origins as a genuine effort by two black women to incite meaningful change, one might assume the sea of black squares to be an exercise in Instagram-performance art, a comment on the pitfalls of social media as a playground for performative allyship. Decontextualised in this manner, the posts feel reminiscent of the work of contemporary artist Amelia Ulman, whose body of work ‘Excellences & Perfections’ is often credited as being the ‘first Instagram masterpiece’, (Langmiur, 2016) a scripted online performance and insight into issues of online identity.
Suffice to say, the image above is no mere performance piece where content is exaggerated for the purpose of social commentary, but rather an insight into wider issues of performative activism/allyship. The latter terms went from being unheard of by many social media users, to being incredibly ubiquitous over the course of the summer — which saw countless brands and public figures (with histories of racist behaviour/ which presently uphold racist structures) putting simple white text on a black background without acknowledging how they’ve been part of the problem or showcasing any kind of strategy moving forward, as in the examples below. Similar to the concepts of ‘virtue signalling’ and ‘wokeness’, performative activism reflects the notion of sharing content related to a specific cause with the aim of increasing one’s social capital, as opposed to out of genuine commitment to said cause.
In many ways, #BlackoutTuesday operates as an analogy for the ways in which performative activism functions, exposing its potential to incite more harm than it does change or advancement in society. Ultimately, this is due to the specific nature of the phenomenon — which will be outlined in the points below. Posting a black square with the hashtag ‘blacklivesmatter’ and a short, ambiguous phrase such as ‘muted and listening’ is:
1. Easy
Considering the sheer seconds it takes to screenshot a black square and upload it onto Instagram with a hashtag at the least and some links to organisations to donate to at most, participation requires little to no critical thought. This is not to suggest that every user who posted a black square is not committed to being actively anti-racist, but to note that the anatomy of the post — a black square and links or a few words, makes it incredibly easy to post out of nothing but a desire to look good, one of the possible motivations for virtue signalling as outlined by Jordan (2020). Though those who partook in #BlackoutTuesday may have experienced genuine outrage, the ease with which one could post the square allowed it to function as a ‘blank slate onto which one was to project the desire of herself as a better human — outraged, solidary, sad’ (Tulic, 2020). The same can be said of simply posting a vague quote about equality or the phenomenon of temporary profile pictures. Supporting causes in this way may inhibit some from taking further action. Indeed, this is likely to have been the case considering that on June 2nd, 28 million people are said to have posted a black square, yet only 13 million had signed the petition to arrest the police that killed George Floyd according to AJ Brinnand (2020) writing for teneighty magazine.
2. Reductive
The notion of using a black square to somehow spark change when systemic racism is at play, is incredibly reductive. In its reductionist approach, #BlackoutTuesday has been likened to ‘Black square’, a suprematist painting created in 1915 by the Russian artist Kazimir Malevich which was revolutionary in the art world as the first painting which did not represent anything.
Writing retrospectively, Malevich (1927) states ‘In the year 1913, trying desperately to free art from the dead weight of the real world, I took refuge in the form of the square.’ He wanted to create a painting that didn’t depict the real world, which purposely didn’t engage with arguments or ideas. Social media users also wanted to say something by saying nothing. Not posting, not commenting, not liking would have been invisible to everyone but the people monitoring data at Instagram. Posting a black square lets one’s following know: I wanted to say nothing, but I wanted to be seen. Rather than amplifying the voices that had something to say they just wanted to be a part of the conversation and which is nothing if not futile.
According to Khuroum Bhukari (2020) while the painting ‘Black Square’, was an:
‘emptying out, of all the habits, tricks, skills, clutter and values associated with painting — the Black Square used by many today is an emptying out of voice and inimical to articulated and vocalised anti-racism.’
3. Obscures information
Apart from the performative aspect of it, the main reason #blackouttuesday prompted rebuttal was its hijacking of the broader hashtag #blacklivesmatter. By millions of Instagram users tagging the movement, algorithms were distorted — crucial information about protests in the US, anti-racist education posts as well as links to petitions were being effectively drowned out. This counter-productivity mimics the counter-productive aspect of performative allyship as a whole, which can prevent users from engaging with more meaningful acts of activism such as signing petitions, as shown in the example of George Floyd above.
Interestingly, the notion of obscuring information also appears in Malevich’s black square painting. In 2015, art historians discovered text under the black paint, a crudely racial missive reading: ‘battle of negroes in a dark cave’. In light of this discovery, the painting may no longer be viewed as an empty square but a concealed ‘racist joke’ which was likely to have been written in response to a painting by Paul Bilhaud (Tulic, 2020). Similarly, companies engaging in blatant performative activism/allyship are simply slapping their racist stuctures and histories onto the canvas of social media, and painting over it, in black.
Head to my next blog post to read part 2, which differentiates between the performative activism of brands and individual users and explores the phenomenon of ‘virtue signalling’ as a social behaviour.
This blog is a project for Study Unit MCS3953, University of Malta
References
Bhukari, K. (2020). Art world presses pause for #BlackOutTuesday. Theartnewspaper.com. Retrieved 25 January 2021, from https://www.theartnewspaper.com/news/art-world-presses-pause-for-blackouttuesday.
Brinnand, A. (2020). Retrieved 25 January 2021, from https://teneightymagazine.com/2020/06/03/blackouttuesday-has-more-than-double-the-posts-than-george-floyd-petition-signatures/.
Coscarelli, J. (2020). #BlackoutTuesday: A Music Industry Protest Becomes a Social Media Moment. Nytimes.com. Retrieved 25 January 2021, from https://www.nytimes.com/2020/06/02/arts/music/what-blackout-tuesday.html.
Five ways to look at Malevich’s Black Square — List | Tate. Tate. (2021). Retrieved 25 January 2021, from https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artists/kazimir-malevich-1561/five-ways-look-malevichs-black-square.
Jordan, J. J., & Rand, D. G. (2020). Signaling when no one is watching: A reputation heuristics account of outrage and punishment in one-shot anonymous interactions. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 118(1), 57–88.
Langmiur, M. (2016). Amalia Ulman Is the First Great Instagram Artist. ELLE. Retrieved 25 January 2021, from https://www.elle.com/culture/art-design/a38857/amalia-ulman-instagram-artist/.
Malevich, K. (1959). The Non-Objective World. Paul Theobald and Company.
Tulic, S. (2020). Desire Was A Single Black Square. Degree Critical. Retrieved 25 January 2021, from https://degreecritical.com/2020/06/26/desire-was-a-single-black-square/.
