Keep 1984 In the Past
Keep 1984 in the Past
Dissent has been framed as unpatriotic, science has been politicized, and reality itself has become contested ground—a parallel to Orwell’s 1984’s “2 + 2 = 5” coercion. In 1984 by George Orwell, the Political Party enforces control through surveillance (the telescreens), thought policing (the concept of thoughtcrime), and the obliteration of independent reasoning (doublethink). Citizens who dissent are broken not just by physical torture but by the systematic erasure of their inner world—memories, loves, capacity to question.
The art piece is a visual allegory bridging George Orwell’s dystopian vision in 1984 and the contemporary political climate—where truth, dissent, and autonomy of thought are under siege. The work embodies resistance not as violent upheaval but as organic, persistent creation—a defiance that blooms even under oppression. This piece rejects the idea that resistance must be violent to be effective, instead focusing on resistance stemming from creation, imagination and reclamation of knowledge. The artist argues that we must reclaim the mind as sacred ground where new worlds are seeded, and where knowing, imagining, and creating are acts of insurrection.
In any authoritarian regime, the most dangerous rebel is not the one who fights with a gun, but the one who thinks with a mind in full bloom.
KayLeigh Fitzgerald is a multimedia artist, writer, and peace scholar whose work lives at the intersections of resistance, embodiment, and radical imagination. Drawing from her background in conflict transformation and decolonial theory, her digital collages and visual designs explore the emotional landscapes of protest, the politics of visibility, and the quiet revolutions of thought and care. Whether reclaiming the pin-up form or igniting flowers from flame, her art resists systems of erasure with unapologetic beauty and defiance. She is the Editorial Assistant at Mukoli: The Magazine for Peace, where she helps cultivate a creative space for collective healing, political memory, and liberated futures.