Executive Dis/Order,Featured,Lesson Plans |
October 29, 2025

About the Dis/Order Project Lesson Series

This lesson plan is part of a series of assignments and activities developed for the Dis/Order Project, which examines contemporary politics and political art as a tool of resistance against executive power and anticipatory compliance. Each unit in this series focuses on a different Executive Dis/Order submission—an artistic and textual intervention into the political landscape—analyzing its themes, rhetorical strategies, and creative methods of refusal. The series covers a range of topics, reflecting the diverse ways executive actions impact communities. Other lessons in the series may address issues such as immigration, DEI crackdowns, gender policies, environmental deregulation, and academic freedom.

Each unit centers a different executive order and offers a sample political art piece (an Executive Dis/Order submission) as a case study for analysis and creative response. Lessons can be used individually or as part of a larger unit on public political art, executive power, or artistic resistance. The structure follows a repeatable format: information about the executive order, background and context for the order, close analysis of the artwork, discussion and critique of its themes and artistic strategies, and a hands-on creative exercise where students generate their own responses. Instructors are encouraged to modify discussions and activities to fit their students’ engagement levels and course goals.

Lesson Plan: Rage Painting as Affective Critique

This lesson plan was created to accompany the art piece below, which was submitted in response to state-mandated higher education budget cuts that forced universities to eliminate dozens of academic programs across disciplines.

  • Estimated time: 1–2 class sessions
  • Grade level: Late high school, undergraduate, and early graduate students
  • License: Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 (CC BY-NC)
  • Relevant subjects/fields of study: Gender and Sexuality Studies; Feminist Philosophy; Political Theory; Visual/Media Studies

1. Learning Goals

Students will:

  • Articulate feminist and queer theoretical perspectives on anger and rage as politically generative affect.
  • Analyze how artistic strategies convey political and emotional force in visual protest.
  • Produce an original rage-inspired artwork or media project that channels anger as a mode of inquiry and resistance.

2. Art Object Focus

  • Title: Rage Painting
  • Artist: Debjani Chakravarty
  • Medium: Digital painting
  • Themes: Rage, affect, feminist anger, neoliberal austerity, political refusal, affective critique
  • Artist Statement:
    “Universities in my state have cut numerous academic programs (at this point, my own university has cut 81, according to The Salt Lake Tribune) in response to the state legislature’s mandate to cut higher education budget. The cuts span humanities, social sciences, STEM, critical professional/human services, and healthcare programs. The state mandate follows something called Mandate for Leadership: The Conservative Promise, known widely as Project 2025. The following are some randomly selected quotes from said mandate, with page numbers:
    • ‘As Washington begins to downsize its intervention in education, existing funding should be sent to states as grants over which they have full control, enabling states to put federal funding toward any lawful education purpose under state law’ (322).
    • ‘Congress should cap the indirect cost rate paid to universities so that it does not exceed the lowest rate a university accepts from a private organization to fund research efforts. This market-based reform would help reduce federal taxpayer subsidization of leftist agendas’ (355).
    • ‘The American labor market continues to experience a glut of college degrees. The country produces more college graduates than suitable jobs for them to fill. Meanwhile, employers exacerbate the problem, fueling demand for college by needlessly requiring degrees for many jobs’ (596).

This is a rage painting created digitally that re/presents a few cut programs, randomly picked from a long list, along with an explanation (among others) that we have been given. This work represents my views and sentiments as a private citizen and taxpayer, and I DO NOT REPRESENT MY EMPLOYER UNIVERSITY.”

  • Description: The background of this digital image has been covered in horizontal swaths of different colors – orange, pink, neon yellow, dark red, blue – that have the appearance and texture of metallic oil paint, with finger-like streaks running vertically down the canvas. Text typed in red down the left side reads, We’re saving taxpayer money. The names of some eliminated departments are written in light blue across the canvas: Arabic, Chemistry Teaching, Educational Psychology, Earth Science Teaching, German Teaching, Mine Health and Safety, Music Composite Teaching, Political Science Teaching, Russian Teaching, Sustainable Resource Development, Turkish, Veteran Studies, and Water Sanitation and Health.

3. Pre-Lesson Planning

Instructor Preparation:

  • Facilitate access to the painting and assigned readings (see Suggested Readings & Resources at the end of this lesson plan).
  • Familiarize yourself with feminist and queer theories of rage and anger.

Student Preparation (optional):

  • Complete assigned readings (see Suggested Readings & Resources at the end of this lesson plan).

4. Lesson Activities

A. Warm-Up Discussion (10–15 minutes)

  • When is anger political? When is anger generative?
  • What does the field of feminist studies say about anger?
  • What political or feminist value might anger hold?

B. Guided Analysis (30–40 minutes)

I. Content and Expression

  • Which programs are made visible in the painting, and what is the effect of their distortion or obliteration?
  • How do marks, colors, and fragments of text communicate intensity and grief?
  • How does this artistic strategy differ from slogan-based or textual protest art?

II. Context and Interpretation

  • How does the painting resonate with Lorde’s claim that anger clarifies and propels action?
  • In what ways does Scheman frame anger as epistemically mobilizing?
  • How does Friedrich position rage as critique?
  • How does the Women’s Studies International Forum essay underscore the political dismissal or devaluation of women’s rage?

C. Creative Response Activity (30–45 minutes)

Students will create their own rage painting or other rage-inspired media in response to a political or personal issue of significance. They may use painting, collage, zines, digital art, posters, or audiovisual mediums. The emphasis is on affective force rather than technical refinement.

D. Post-Activity Reflection & Discussion (10–15 minutes)

  • What issue did you choose to represent, and why?
  • How did your process of making give shape to anger?
  • Did the act of creation shift how you understood the anger you began with?
  • What possibilities open up when rage becomes public and legible through art?

5. Suggested Readings & Resources

Available Online or Open Access

May Require Purchase or Institutional Access

  • Scheman, Naomi. “Anger and the Politics of Naming.” In Feminist Interpretations of Hilary Putnam (Penn State University Press, 1996).
  • Ahmed, Sara. The Cultural Politics of Emotion (Routledge, 2004).
  • Srinivasan, Amia. “The Aptness of Anger.” Journal of Political Philosophy 26(2), 2018.