Front Lines: A Lifetime of Drawing Resistance

Front Lines: A Lifetime of Drawing Resistance

Art can be more dangerous than words—especially when it marches, masks up, and takes to the streets. Front Lines: A Lifetime of Drawing Resistance is a vivid, image-rich memoir and archive chronicling six decades of Susan Simensky Bietila’s life as a movement artist, agitator, and cultural conspirator. From underground newspapers of the 1960s to Indigenous-led water protection actions and puppet-filled protest marches of today, Bietila has never stopped making trouble—or making art. Rejecting the elitist, male-dominated art world, Bietila came of age in the McCarthy era. She embraced feminist, collaborative, and radically democratic forms of creativity. Her political posters, comics, protest banners, masks, and giant puppets have armed countless front lines of struggle. Her art has appeared in the pages of World War 3 Illustrated and RAT Subterranean News and is wheat-pasted worldwide in the streets. With over one hundred images, eleven comics, and a deeply insightful narrative context, Front Lines is both a blueprint for artists who want to fuel social movements and a testament to the enduring power of art made in, with, and for resistance. “Art is not simply about what you create, it is where you situate your art and where you form community. Most artists look to the ‘art world’—a location that largely serves the 1 percent. Not Susan Simensky Bietila. She has placed her art at the front lines of social justice movements since the 1960s. She is an ally in the truest sense. Front Lines is remarkable, and her path is a blueprint for other artists looking to do the same.” —Nicolas Lampert, author of A People’s Art History of the United States: 250 Years of Activist Art and Artists Working in Social Justice Movements “I have known Susan Simensky Bietila for basically my entire adult life, but until I read this book, I did not fully understand how amazing her life has been. Front Lines is an artistic autobiography of a lifetime of activist adventures, but it is so much more than this. Sue vividly narrates dozens of social struggles over the past six decades—antiwar, antiracist, feminist, working class, health care, educational, environmental, anarchist, Indigenous sovereignty, antigentrification, and beyond—centering the efforts of multiple generations of the greatest artist-activists you’ve probably never heard of. With vibrant prose and even more powerful images, this book provides essential history lessons and bold inspiration for our collective struggle to build a free society.” —Michael Staudenmaier, coauthor of We Go Where They Go: The Story of Anti-Racist Action “I met Susan Simensky Bietila in 1970, when a handful of radical women came together to take over RAT newspaper. Sue’s artistic talent bowled us over. Those were the heady days of the second wave of feminism, when women declared that biological sex could not circumscribe our lives, could not determine how we dressed or behaved, or what careers we could aspire to. But we at RAT weren’t just careerists—we were driven to pursue social and economic justice. And even after the newspaper folded, many of us continued in that pursuit. Especially Sue, who never flagged, never gave up. This book will be an inspiration to all of us.” —Martha Shelley, author of We Set the Night on Fire: Igniting the Gay Revolution “Susan Simensky Bietila's art has been part of the fabric that has been elemental in expressing what they call radical ideas and communicating to the broader world about the possibilities for humanity. This is true, and will continue to be true, whether anyone knows Susan's name or not. But those who do know her name, and become familiar with more of her work, and her fascinating personal story that's in the pages of this book, will be glad that they did.” —David Rovics, author of Sing for Your Supper: A DIY Guide to Playing Music, Writing Songs, and Booking Your Own Gigs “For over thirty years, Susan Simensky Bietila’s art has informed the public about the significant, but underreported grassroots struggles to protect Upper Midwest Indigenous and rural communities from dangerous mining and fossil fuel pipeline projects. Her richly detailed drawings in Front Lines remind people that their stories are life-affirming and need to be passed on to the next generation of water protectors. Her art has consistently celebrated the marginalized voices of Indigenous peoples and the rights of rivers, forests and the region’s sacred wild rice beds to be protected from exploitation and industrial pollution. Her puppets of the Sturgeon and Heron have been carried on the shores of Lake Superior, the Menominee River and wherever grassroots movements have resisted corporate assaults on the environment. This is how art energizes social movements.” —Al Gedicks, executive secretary of the Wisconsin Resources Protection “By weaving a narrative of life story and art, Susan Simensky Bietila reminds us how critical it is to learn the history of