Artist Research Project: Joseph DeLappe

DeLappe is a media artist who works as an Associate Professor of the department of art at the University of Nevada. DeLappe is most famous for his protests on the Iraq war. He runs a website called Iraqimemorial.org. He has done many memorials for the civilian and soldier casualties in Iraq. He has done a series of protests and reenactments within computer games and online communities. One such protest occurred while playing a first person shooter game that was produced by the Defense Department. This game is called America's Army. He then made his character drop his weapon. The character was killed in the mayhem of the video game. In the chat box he proceeded to type the name, age, service branch, and date of death of each and every American casualty in Iraq. This protest was done in March, 2006. This was close to the time of the third anniversary of the United States being in Iraq.

DeLappe is also famous in the Second Life Community. He created a character named MGandhi Chakrabarti. This character looked exactly like Gandhi. From March 12-April 6, 2008 (26 day march with 3 rest days) he reenacted Gandhi’s 1930-1931 prison term imposed on him by the British as well as his 248-mile march to Dandi. The march to Dandi was Gandhi’s 1930 march in protest of the British salt tax. In this march, Gandhi was trying to protest the British rule in India. Everyone in India used salt and the British imposed taxes on it. Gandhi marched 248 miles to Dandi, a village near the seashore. Upon arrival, Gandhi began telling the people to boil the mud to get the salt out of it. This was illegal for Indians to do. Gandhi was arrested for doing this but the aftermath of this protest reached all the way across India. Gandhi was protesting bad government. DeLappe is on a similar mission. To bring attention to what he believes are "crimes" being done by the U.S. government. DeLappe was trying to get peoples attention by simulating this walk in hope that it would have the same effects as Gandhi's march. Gandhi was criticized by many for what he did very much like DeLappe.
This march was not necessarily done to protest state power. It was more to just show how useful and important peaceful protests are. This was also done for a few reasons. It was done to honor Gandhi's legendary trek as well as a form of civil disobedience. Along the way, DeLappe would stop when he saw people so that he could give them gifts and chat them to tell them what his march was all about. Many people followed him on his excursion. He never flew and only teleported a few times to get from island to island. DeLappe wanted this march to be as realistic as possible.
He simulated this while at Chelsea’s Eyebeam Art and Technology Center. He hooked himself up to a Nordic Trak Walkfit machine. He actually walked his second life character all the way through the march. His footsteps were connected from the machine to his computer. DeLappe did this to show the effectiveness of a peaceful protest and to get online users involved in such demonstrations.

While the second life Gandhi was in prison, DeLappe began writing out the Bus-era Torture memos. These memos were between CIA agents, talking about how they were supposed to torture their prisoners. As we can see, DeLappe was really against the war in Iraq and the things that went on.  DeLappe used cyberspace to show his feelings of anti-war in Iraq. It shows how much influence one man can have on the thoughts and feelings of thousands of people. People like DeLappe don't even need to leave their house to do these things. In an age where computers rule the world, he is making the most of this technology.

From DeLappe’s works we can see the power of the Internet. He has used the new media to get his message across. He has captured the attention of thousands of people to the horrors of the Iraq war. He has dedicated much of his work to those who died in battle. He is even using second life to capture the attention of video gamers as well. His works have gained both support and criticism from many people in the online community. In the video on the bottom of this report, we can see people chatting on the game saying things like, "lets kick him" (from the server) and "why are you doing this?" I don't believe that his protest on America's Army had a huge impact on the gamers at the moment. Most of the gamers were simply frustrated at him for not playing the game and just making himself die every time. It was more about when he recorded this and showed it on the Internet. Most kids who play video games don't really care about the war in Iraq. To them, war is cool! When in reality, it sucks. Perhaps this is why DeLappe made this demonstration on the video game. To influence the kids who have been mesmerized by the art of war in video game form.
Some of his physical works were in the form of cardboard statues that he made. He made a bunch that were made to represent Gandhi and some others that were shaped like the dead-in-Iraq soldiers in the America's Army Game. These works were not as powerful as the protests he had done online but they were a reminder to those who are familiar with his work.
He has also done some different somewhat random works. He did a piece where he put two computer mouses together to make a heart. Another of his pieces was a big ball of joysticks. When asked about this piece, he said it was to see how useless the joysticks are. They are a useless part of our lives. 

Joseph DeLappe

Gandhi