Hrag Vartanian
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hrag.bsky.social
Hrag Vartanian
@hrag.bsky.social
Art Critic Futurist 🧬 Editor-at-large, cofounder of @Hyperallergic.com 🗽 Aleppo born, Toronto raised, Brooklyn based w/ @veken.bsky.social

I tweet about art and politics because art doesn't exist in a vacuum.
Reposted by Hrag Vartanian
Solidarity is so powerful...
@climatefamsnyc.bsky.social
January 24, 2026 at 3:37 AM
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well well well look who’s afraid of memes now
CNN: DHS officials have come to FEMA staff and told them to limit the use of the word ice…they are worried that by posting something like, watch out for the ice, that it's going to become a meme….
January 24, 2026 at 12:48 AM
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On a downtown street in Minneapolis, as people stream out from the massive march, Mary Tyler Moore says “fuck ice.”
January 23, 2026 at 10:29 PM
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Apart from anything else there are no penguins in Greenland. Unless he’s invading the South Pole too….
January 23, 2026 at 10:32 PM
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TL,DR: Deni Avdija is a genocide apologist.
January 22, 2026 at 2:38 PM
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AOC: An agency that is attacking U.S. citizens, kidnapping five-year-olds and using them as bait, and privately circulating the idea that they can violate the rights of Americans by busting down their doors—they deserve to be defunded, and I’ll take any step in that direction.
January 22, 2026 at 11:29 PM
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This is an unbelievably stupid and short-sighted decision.

We need to come up with a catchy term to label these irrational positions that the MAGA cult keeps taking, the right wing alternative to "woke," decisions driven by ideology rather than science or reason.
The United States has officially withdrawn from the World Health Organization.

This is a shameful move that puts both Americans and people all over the world at greater risk from disease outbreaks, which require international collaboration to contain.
January 23, 2026 at 12:47 PM
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Please God.
A major coalition is launching a general strike in Minnesota tomorrow, aimed at pushing out ICE.

It includes:

-Amalgamated Transit Union Local 1005
-The MN AFL-CIO
-SEIU Local 26
-UNITE HERE Local 17
-CWA Local 7250
-Saint Paul and Minneapolis Federations of Educators
-Faith leaders

And more. 🧵
January 23, 2026 at 2:54 AM
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They’ve only received “more than 30” letters?

Let’s help them out and give them some more feedback, y’all.

[gift link]
Fine Arts Panel, Remade by Trump, Indicates Support for His Ballroom Plan
www.nytimes.com
January 23, 2026 at 1:26 AM
The Walker Art Center and the Minneapolis Institute of Art are among the hundreds of businesses shuttering on January 23 in protest of the ICE killing of Renee Macklin Good.
Minnesota Art Spaces to Close in Solidarity With Anti-ICE Strike
The Walker Art Center and the Minneapolis Institute of Art are among the hundreds of businesses shuttering on January 23 in protest of the ICE killing of Renee Macklin Good.
hyperallergic.com
January 23, 2026 at 1:13 AM
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this is a photograph of an American being tortured by a federal agent
An observer arrested in Suth Minneapolis. Photo by Richard Tsong-Taatarii/The Minnesota Star Tribune
January 21, 2026 at 10:19 PM
You feel the military presence in Halifax more than any other city I've visited in Canada.
January 21, 2026 at 9:16 PM
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C-Suite said they use AI for like 80% of their job, if you're wondering which jobs at a company could be replaced by AI
January 21, 2026 at 4:03 PM
Hey guys, Maybe stop posting about that shitty newspaper that got us into this mess with their whatsboutism and complicity masked as debate?
January 21, 2026 at 1:40 AM
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James Baldwin and Martin Luther King, Jr. warned us in the 1960s that the US could come to our current state.
January 20, 2026 at 11:45 PM
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Bishop Robert Barron is vastly more outraged at the church service being interrupted yesterday than he is with ICE surveilling a Catholic Mass and grabbing a Catholic Church worker at Mass. And he’s a “Catholic Bishop” in Minnesota.
January 19, 2026 at 11:33 PM
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Congratulations everyone, Big Brother wasn’t imposed on you, you bought Big Brother on Prime Day and installed him yourselves.
January 19, 2026 at 1:57 PM
This AI video about the defense of Greenland is powerful.
Greenland Defense Front - The Hungry Giant (Official Music Video)
YouTube video by demonflyingfox
youtu.be
January 19, 2026 at 7:17 PM
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If protesters were getting paid, there's be a massive chain of solicitations, emails that would easily prove the case. There is none

Any TV interviewer needs to demand proof when this claim is made and end the interview when it's not provided
Rep. Byron Donalds: "These agitators -- who by the way are paid, folks. America, they are paid to do this kind of mess."
January 19, 2026 at 3:41 PM
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Oh. Only a month later and without further reporting or even minor changes. Wow. Crazy. Guess it was really worth pulling.
CBS reportedly will air a piece tonight on El Salvador's notorious CECOT prison — a story that the network infamously pulled last month
Reports: CBS To Air Pulled '60 Minutes' CECOT Segment Tonight
www.huffpost.com
January 18, 2026 at 8:49 PM
Reading the Game Changer (Heated Rivalry) series by Rachel Reid in Halifax is interesting because the male types make more sense here, including the large lumberjack types you see more here than other places I’ve lived or spent time. Also the Lebanese-Canadian character.
January 18, 2026 at 1:44 PM
Nova Scotia is quite beautiful, even in the cold.
January 17, 2026 at 11:34 PM
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Instead of investigating the death of Renee Good, Trump wants to investigate Governor Walz & Mayor Frey. Despicable.

This is a clear weaponization of justice against Trump's political rivals & a desperate attempt to distract from ICE's growing brutality & Trump's lawlessness.
January 17, 2026 at 12:42 AM
This is why businesses may be doing the right thing by banning ICE from their premises.
One of the stories that makes me the saddest out of this ICE invasion is one out of the Minnesota Star Tribune today about ICE agents eating at a little Mexican restaurant in the small town of Willmar, Minn, —and then, when they were done, arresting some of the workers.
January 16, 2026 at 1:54 AM
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A synecdoche of the crackdown on immigrants. They take advantage of their contributions to our country and punish them nonetheless.
One of the stories that makes me the saddest out of this ICE invasion is one out of the Minnesota Star Tribune today about ICE agents eating at a little Mexican restaurant in the small town of Willmar, Minn, —and then, when they were done, arresting some of the workers.
January 16, 2026 at 1:52 AM