Apart from the scheduled demonstrations and rallies, Occupy Wall Street at Zuccotti Park resembles a flee market. The park is filled with makeshift information kiosks, food stands, first aid/nurses stands, a small lending library, a section where people can play music, recite poetry, and even a place to charge your electronics. All of this, with the addition of the no longer existing tarps, created a tight labyrinth that led deeper into the park and finally out. To be in it was to be consumed by the refuge these protesters have created and it is forgotten that the glitzy Brooks Brothers boutique is right across the street. Completely ironic yet absolutely necessary.

In New York City, a change in political perspective usually affects the arts also. The Occupy Wall Street movement is no exception. Artists such as Shepard Fairey and Eric Drooker have designed posters for the movement. To see more of the OWS posters, click here. Fairey talks of this particular piece of replacing Obama’s campaign poster with the Guy Fawkes mask to symbolize the protesters’ hope that Obama will support their cause. However, many artists have been inspired by the movement in more subtle ways. As history will prove, it seems as though the idea of the tortured artist is an accurate one. As Jerry Saltz explains in his Has Money Ruined Art? article, art seems to be of higher quality and serve deeper purpose when it is inspired by something other than money. And what greater inspiration can political, economic, and cultural turmoil be to New York City artists? Declared underrated painter by Saltz, Jason Fox says, “In these conservative times, it’s easy for art to become hollowed out from any progressive or radical energy and exist only as a bourgeois decoration.” Since the value of art has always been subjective and a bit undefinable, the group of self proclaimed art connoisseurs who just happen to be rich art collectors have measured the value of a piece by the price tag. Art has become celebrated by how much money can be thrown at it and as Fox says, is simply a decoration instead of a creative expression of the artist.

Occupy Wall Street has also affected and inspired popular culture such as the comedy website, Collegehumor.com. With over 10 million website visitors over a 5 month period, their political banter can potentially educate their many viewers. Recently, they uploaded a video which parodied OWS’ motto of “We are the 99 Percent!” They created a video called “We are the 1%” which was a mocking take of how the top wealthiest one percent are reacting to the movement. It insults the one percent’s defenses with dry humor while educating their audience.Watch We Are the 1% here. As established and high brow artists and pop culture entertainers draw inspiration from the movement to create higher quality work, the Occupy Wall Street movement is only gaining more attention and thus, support spreading like wildfire.