It's been a busy Mardi Gras season at Occupy The Stage.

On January 19, Occupy The Stage rolled in krewedelusion - the parade that follows Krewe du Vieux, which kicks of Mardi Gras.

Our Krewe "Guise of Fawkes" made a "You can't jail an idea" float to show solidarity with  imprisoned hactivists and Free Anons.

We were thrilled to receive donations of flags and stickers from Hammond Support Network and Blastedrat to use as throws during the parade. Along with our own handmade throws (voodoo dolls, chalk with Chalkupy instructions, and buttons we made with our button machine), these stickers made our parade great, and we hope to have raised awareness about Jeremy Hammond's unfair bail denial and the prison sentence he is facing.

Check out our full write-up and the photo set below!

The Super Bowl's presence in New Orleans changed the parade schedule, so we had a whole weekend to focus on OpSuperBowl, which involved winning an ACLU lawsuit against Mayor Landrieu and the City of New Orleans. 

We won the right to carry signs and banners that did not contain 60% NFL branding.  

See Our Press Release! and The Gambit Weekly's Update "ACLU reaches agreement with city on Clean Zone lawsuit" for details. 

It didn't end there. We spent the week leading up to the Super Bowl conducting outreach about the NFL's non-profit status and the negative effect the Super Bowl had on local businesses and New Orleans taxi drivers (for full coverage of small_affair's citizen journalism, see her blog Whose Streets. 

Full text from slide show is available here!

Occupy The Stage met at 3pm in Jackson Square on Super Bowl Sunday and held a creative procession to celebrate our First Amendment right to free speech show solidarity with local artists, vendors, and workers.  A female Jesus led a procession of monks who chanted while holding wooden hand-painted signs bearing slogans that included "Thou Shalt Not Create a Police State" and "Honor The Small Businesses." Our slideshow and video are below.

This was a wonderful day, and we enjoyed the local artists' enthusiasm for our performance. 

Our antics did not go unnoticed by the FBI's Joint Task Force. When the power went out in the Super Dome, police radio scanners mentioned that the FBI was monitoring Occupy NOLA members.

AUDIO: at 18:26 mark dispatcher says FBI monitoring “Occupy NOLA” movement during Super Dome outage.

Occupy The Stage's Mardi Gras Krewe -  Guise of Fawkes - rolled with the Society of Saint Anne on Mardi Gras Day (February 12).

Our Free Anons float included paper hearts people could use to write Valentines to mail to political prisoners as part of #OpValentine! We've collected and addressed the Valentines and will be sending Mardi Gras love to political prisoners. 

See our Mardi Gras Day slideshow below!

It's been a busy few weeks, and we are really grateful to all of our online and on ground supporters.

Happy Valentine's Day!

~ OTS

Occupy The Stage 2013 Calendars can be purchased through LuLu. All proceeds made from calendars will go to producing propaganda and materials for Occupy art and the Occupy Puppet Theater.

The Occupy Puppet Theater has really taken off, and today Occupy The Stage participated in a Charivari against Austerity. The Puppet Theater was involved along with our latest "banker" puppet who printed his own money and denied several bystanders the opportunity to open an account.

Creative Props included a birdcage stuffed with  spray-painted orange dolls that represented the prison-industrial complex and over-crowded jails and some "Evict the Rich" punching balloons, along with creative signs and hand-made instruments. 


This action was part of  "Solidarity Against Austerity" planned in conjunction with The Gulf Coast People's Convention.

Nov 4th – Knitting a simple scarf on straight needles (intro to knitting)

Nov 11th – Knitting simple fingerless gloves on double pointed needles

Nov 18th – Mixed media bamboo tile accessories & pendants

Nov 25th – Faux quilted holiday ornaments

Dec 2nd – Simple jewelry-making with beads and charms!

Dec 9th –  Open workshop day/ Anti-Austerity theme encouraged. The Walmart Elves will be attending as well.

Dec 16th – Help with last minute crafts/catchup/recap

CopBlock has announced the 2nd Annual Chalk the Police National Day of Action & Chalking Contest!

October 1 also happens to be the Birthday of Marijuana Prohibition.


#ExpectUs #ChalkThePolice

From CopBlock:

Attention all chalkers, organizers, and lovers of artful dissent! It’s that time of year again to open up the buckets of chalk and find the nearest location of state repression (aka police stations, courthouses, jails) or other public property such as sidewalks, parks or public plazas at the 2nd Annual Chalk the Police Day.

During the 1st Annual Chalk the Police Day (link: http://www.copblock.org/8710/chalk-the-police-day-a-huge-success/), we had videos and photos from small groups and large groups of chalkers in cities such as Phoenix (link: http://youtu.be/pFIP5mpcwqU ) and Keene, NH (link: http://youtu.be/TD0DjUmcHoo).

Over the past year, many chalkers have been arrested, detained, harassed and jailed by authorities across this country (link: http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2012/08/war-chalk-arrests). From the Chalking 8 (link: http://www.copblock.org/7411/chalk/) to the Chalk Walk Police Riots in LA (link: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/07/13/5th-spring-downtown-la-chalk-protest_n_1670194.html), chalking continues to be seen as a threat to status quo and despite the temporary nature of chalk, police and local authorities continue to crack down on our right to free expression.

We must not remain silent! We have the right to chalk and the right to hold our local police accountable for their actions. If you agree, please organize a chalking event in your area on Monday, October 1st. Please feel free to make this event your own and bring signs, fliers, maybe some music and snacks - and of course, lots of chalk to share with your local chalking group. We encourage organizers to host their event on the date of action, Monday October 1st but recognize that some individuals or groups may want to host an event the weekend before due to time or weather constraints.

If you use facebook, please create an event and invite your friends! Also, please RSVP to this Facebook event for the National Chalk the Police Day. We will also try to list all the events here.

Do you need extra motivation to chalk? This year there is a fun contest with prizes in each of the categories!

Categories:

Best Mural/Chalk Art Design - For the chalk artists who love to draw and can create great murals.

Best Chalk Saying/Slogan – Can’t draw but have a way with words? This category is for you!

Best Location – Chalk the jails? Chalk the steps of city hall? Is there any interesting public property to chalk in your area? We’ll be giving a prize for best location.

The best entry in each category will get $66 worth of items from Cop Block's store (link: http://copblock.org/store). Also, the winner of the Best Mural/Chalk Art Design will receive a Box of Eternity Art High Quality Sidewalk Chalk (you pick up to 35 of your favorite colors!) (link: http://www.eternityarts.com/street-painting-chalk-art/street-painting-supplies/basic-street-chalk/)

Judges: There will be a three “judge” panel with one person each from the East (Kate Ager), Midwest (Melissa Hill), and West Coast (Allan Eaton) that will review the photographs of the chalk and rank them.

How to Enter: Please send all photographs of chalking (or short videos) to copblock@gmail.com or post them as a comment to this Facebook Event.

All entries will need to be submitted before 11:59pm CST Wednesday, October 3rd, 2012 for this contest to allow the judges time to view the pictures and video. To be fair, please only submit chalkings that were created between Friday, Sept. 28th – October 2nd for the October 1st Chalk the Police event. The winners will be announced on Friday, October 5th.

You can arrest the chalker but you can’t stop the chalk!

Throughout history, signs and symbols have played an integral part in communication among revolutionaries, activists, and so-called "hooligans."

For years I've been fascinated by Hoboglyphs, or images hobos drew to communicate information about specific locations. Hobos were known to utilize a series of small glyphs in an effort of solidarity to warn and support other travelers.  Often scrawled hastily (and sometimes with chalk)  on gates or telephone poles, the Hobo Signs would let other hobos know if work was available in a particular town, if police tolerated hobos, or if an area was safe to camp in.  These symbols were also used to covertly share information about available resources. The Hobo Code could add a small element of safety when traveling to new places.

While many modern Hobo Signs apply to situations occupiers face today, I wanted to design Hobo Symbols that specifically address the needs of occupiers. These can be interpreted as art or used in real life much like the hashtag is used on Twitter. For instance, the third image "Sleeping bags only here" is an obvious reference to #sleepfulprotest. I've tried to create images that are simple enough to be drawn quickly (hopefully via chalkupy) while being mindful that some images should be easy to interpret while others perhaps should not be too obvious.

Below are the first few. I have about ten more coming out soon, and hopefully these will be incorporated into a Comix about Tentmonster Bucky - a tentmonster who chalkupies in areas where camping bans are enforced.

Special thanks to Twitter friends @Matericia and @occupy_sxsw for your feedback and support regarding these first nine hobo symbols.

I have many more coming including GA Meets Here, Could Not Find Encampment, Police Target Livestreamers, We bang on stuff and make shit happen, Good Dumpster Diving Nearby, Human Chain Effective form of Peaceful Protest Here, Occupiers Gather Here Regularly, and a few others.

If you have an Occupy Hobo Symbol you'd like to contribute or an idea for an Occupy Hobo Symbol, please contact @small_affair via Twitter, comment on this post,  or use the Contact US link on this website!

~ small affair