Helen Molesworth's book, This Will Have Been: Art, Love & Politics in the 1980s, discusses a time in which desire was sparking the revolution for gender, sexuality, and racial equality. The 1980s became the decade in which people’s demands strived to make progressive changes within the art scene and society. The work produced by artists during this time was a pivotal movement in the world of visual art. Desire in the 1980s centered around equality for women which in turn, lead the investigation of identity for sexuality, and democratic idealism of freedom promised by the political world; furthermore, artists used these longings to create raw visual pieces that were competing for a place next to the rising power of media.
Molesworth defined
…show more content…
Reagan’s presidency was intertwined with the mass-media culture; for the most part, he represented a version of the past that strongly identified with “a nostalgic version…of historical tropes” . David Salle’s Autopsy, 1981 suggested two ends of modernism, merged into one, “geometric abstraction imaged as a decorative tile pattern and the return of the classical nude as a farcical dummy” , truly defining the end of an era, and the birth of a new kind philosophy, and the erasure of strong emphasis on technique. In spite of Reagan’s conservative ideals, it assisted in the influence of feminist and gender art, bringing to the art renowned views from the lives of the …show more content…
The people needed a way to find their identity amidst the crisis brought on by HIV and AIDS; furthermore, "by the end of the decade, gay and lesbian artists had permeated the contemporary art scene with works that dealt specifically of queer desire," as people became more vocal about their desires. Artists were using this desire for acknowledgement, and turning it into works of their own, including, but not limited to those who had contracted the disease themselves. David Wojnarowicz’s Untitled (Buffalo), 1988-89, the pieces represents a range of emotional effects—“rage, futility, and desperation to mourning and guilt” —fear and devastation riddled the gay community, as the AIDS crisis rose to it highest peak. Gay desire was under a scrutinizing eye as the death toll rose, as well as the people’s desire for
In the 70s and 80s, the New York art world was very different from what it is today. Subway cars were riddled with graffiti inside and out. So art was concerned the city was much more chaotic, open and experimental, and favored the ephemeral creators. Feminism and the gay revolution were part of a mixture of values favoring critical attitudes. All were in favor of art and American and international culture were accessible, democratic, rupturistas. Regardless of what seems to us to be the art of those times (one might argue that the gains were higher in the social sphere in the aesthetic), it certainly was a circumscribed to the values of the moment, who advocated the merger of the historical period revolt and imagination? Keith Haring, the prolific and talented gay artist, who belonged to that period.
In the great tradition of classical art, nudity and death have been two main themes of the masters. Sally Mann’s photographs twist this tradition when the nudes are her prepubescent children and the corpses are real people. The issue is that her photographs are a lens into unfiltered actuality, and consumers question the morality of the images based on the fact that children and corpses are unable to give legal consent. Her work feels too personal and too private. Mainly, people question whether or not Mann meant to cause an uproar with her work or if the results were completely unintentional. After looking through what Sally Mann herself has said, it can be determined that both options have a grain of truth. She wanted to provoke thought,
Known for being the father of Pop Art, and a giant in pop culture, Warhol dominated the art scene from the late fifties up until his untimely death in 1987. However Warhol’s influence spread further then the art world, he also was a major player in the LGBT, avant-garde and experimental cinema movements. Born in 1928 in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania to Slovakian immigrant parents, Warhol came from humble beginnings. Becoming widely known for debuting the concept of ‘pop art’ in 1962. Warhol’s reach grew further when he started experimenting with film, becoming a major player in the LGBT, avant-garde and experimental cinema movements. Warhol’s artist studio, known famously as ‘The Factory’ became a hub for experimentation, and a go-to point for celebrities, musicians and trans folk. During this time, Warhol came out as an openly gay man, challenging the status quo of the day, a time when being homosexual was illegal. While also producing highly experiential films such as ‘Blow Job’ (1964) and ‘Sleep’ (1964) which were highly political and provocative, at the time. As art critic Dave Hickey asserts, “Art has political consequences, which is to say, it reorganized society and creates constituencies of people around it” (Hickey, 2007), Andy Warhol’s art and lived experience created a political constituency which can be best recognised in the function of the “Silver Factory” on
Georgia O’Keefe is a famous American painter who painted beautiful flowers and landscapes. But she painted these images in such a way that many people believed she was portraying sexual imagery. “O’Keefe’s depictions of flowers in strict frontality and enlarged to giant scale were entirely original in character . . . the view into the open blossoms evoked an image of the female psyche and invited erotic associations.” (Joachimides 47) O’Keefe denies these allegations and says that she “magnified the scale of the flower only to ensure people would notice them.” (Haskell 203) O’Keefe’s artwork was misinterpreted because of cultural prejudice, her non-traditional lifestyle, and gender bias art criticism. But despite these accusations, Georgia O’Keefe’s artwork was not based on sexuality.
Whitney Chadwick, Women, Art, and Society 3rd ed. (NY: Thames & Hudson world of art, 2002), 153-160.
No other artist has ever made as extended or complex career of presenting herself to the camera as has Cindy Sherman. Yet, while all of her photographs are taken of Cindy Sherman, it is impossible to class call her works self-portraits. She has transformed and staged herself into as unnamed actresses in undefined B movies, make-believe television characters, pretend porn stars, undifferentiated young women in ambivalent emotional states, fashion mannequins, monsters form fairly tales and those which she has created, bodies with deformities, and numbers of grotesqueries. Her work as been praised and embraced by both feminist political groups and apolitical mainstream art. Essentially, Sherman’s photography is part of the culture and investigation of sexual and racial identity within the visual arts since the 1970’s. It has been said that, “The bulk of her work…has been constructed as a theater of femininity as it is formed and informed by mass culture…(her) pictures insist on the aporia of feminine identity tout court, represented in her pictures as a potentially limitless range of masquerades, roles, projections” (Sobieszek 229).
...witty comical banter helps spread the understanding of the underlying themes behind the humor. It makes it easier for the artists to connect with the audience about feminism without an aggressive and hostile approach to the work. I believe viewers are more likely to communicate upon the works of the Guerrilla Girls with one another in society when they take on a more comedic approach. This investigation has examined the Guerrilla Girls through direct connection to the inequalities of compliance of power over women in the art world. Several themes were highlighted within society that reinstated these cultural norms of gender and sex within the institutions of art. With a variety of forms used by the Guerrilla Girls to redefine women's identity in history they were able to break down such barriers that stood in the way which denied the prosperity of female artists.
Feminism and political issues have always been centered on in the art world and artists like to take these ideas and stretch them beyond their true meanings. Female artists such as Hannah Höch, who thrived during the Dada movement in the 1920s in Germany and Barbara Kruger who was most successful during the 1980s to 1990s in the United States, both take these issues and present them in a way that forces the public to think about what they truly mean. Many of Kruger’s works close in on issues such as the female identity and in relation to politics she focuses on consumerism and power. Höch, like Kruger, also focuses on female identity but from the 1920s when feminism was a fairly new concept and like Kruger focuses on politics but focuses more on the issues of her time such as World War I. With the technique of photomontage, these two artists take outside images and put them together in a way that displays their true views on feminism and politics even though both are from different times and parts of the world.
Pop art is an experimental art which surfaced in Great Britain in the early 1950’s. One of the major art movements of the twentieth century, it came into its own in the United States in the late 1950’s. This art form incorporated photographs in ways that had not been utilized before. It utilized mass-culture imagery and iconography, in contrast to the traditional tendencies of fine art. Pop art is considered to be one of the last modern art movements and served as a precursor to postmodern art. The art form is characterized by themes and techniques derived from mass culture, including advertising and comic books. Perhaps one of the most famous Pop artists, is Andy Warhol.
Linda Nochlin in her article, “Why Have There Been No Great Women Artists?” discusses the various aspects to this issue and believes that even though the legal battles of the feminist movement provided formal legal equality to women, too often, it does not ensure substantive equalities. The explanations to this problem can cover the spectrum from sexism to feminism. Nochlin rightly believes that perhaps, the true answer lies in the institutional problems that plague our society. As Nochlin points out, “as late as 1893, lady students were not admitted to life drawing at the Royal Academy in London, and even when they were, after that date, the model had to be partially draped.” The very fact that women artists were denied the right to paint the nude model which was considered critical to the success of any artist validates the point of institutional bias against women. To deny an artist the opportunity to develop proficiency in painting the nude is denying them the prospect of painting historical themes. Most women artists were left with no choice but to concentrate on painting everyday subjects like portraits and still-life. This was a great setback to
“Art must be an expression of love or it is nothing.” Art is just that, one of many ways that people can express love. LOVE by Robert Indiana and The Kiss, by the French sculptor, Auguste Rodin are just two sculptures that demonstrate love. LOVE is a structure of the word love in red with the first two letters above with the “O” slanted, and the last two letters bellow the first two, that is displayed publicly in New York City. The Kiss can now be found in the Musée Rodin in Paris, France. The sculpture is of two characters of the opposite sex kissing. The materials and colors used in the two sculptures, as well as the aspect of love that they represent and the history behind the sculptures, The Kiss seems to be more romantic.
Whereas men had a so-called “head-start” with painting and sculpture, photography was pioneered by and equally associated with both genders. Sexualized images of women circulated via mass media. Described as a voyeuristic medium, photography was a powerful tool in deconstructing the male gaze and bringing private moments into the public domain (Bonney 1985: 11).
The images above are just a few other example of how Keith Haring used similar ideas to create different artworks about stopping the AIDS epidemic. We know that he used his fame in the art world to create a platform on stopping this deadly disease. These piece of artwork all revolve around Keith Haring’s persistence to keep the public eye open about
Examining the statement “the Personal is Political” through the works of Alice Neel. The American portrait artist Alice Neel rose from obscurity as a result of “second wave” feminism, championed by feminist art critics and historians. Since the 1920s she had built a career painting the faces and psyche of the people that surround her. Subverting portraiture’s traditional themes of wealth and power her psychological portraits explore themes of motherhood, assigned gender roles, domestic violence and issue a challenge to the voyeuristic heterosexual male gaze. Themes largely unseen in painting at the time, these themes are in line with the agenda of the feminist movement of the 1970s which fought to highlight the gender imbalance.
Relationship Between Art And Society: Mimesis. The relationship between art and society: Mimesis as discussed in the works of Aristotle, Plato, Horace and Longinus. The relationship between art and society in the works of Plato is based upon his idea of the world of eternal Forms. He believed that there is a world of eternal, absolute and immutable Forms (the world of the Ideal) and thought that this is proven by when man is faced with the appearance of anything in the material world, his mind is moved to a remembrance of the Idea or an absolute and immutable version of the thing he sees.