In a constantly changing world the theme of
“Peace & Security” is a vital topic.
For us peace and security is associated with
unity, and unity lies within erasing restraining
boundaries and borders.
Our exhibition focuses on artists who challenged
the dominant perception of what constitutes
art.
We focus on the theme of unity and erasing
all borders of all kinds.
Salvador Dali was a pioneer of the Surrealism.
In his “Persistence of Memory”, he vanquishes
borders between real and surreal.
We accept the world of the “Persistence
of Memory” because of its naturalistic technique,
even though we notice that the elements within
the image are impossible.
He plays with our minds in a sense that what
we see as familiar we accept to be true.
In such a way, he blurs the boundaries between
realism and surrealism.
Meret Oppenheim does the same thing, but this
time blurring the boundaries between Surrealism
and a Dada’s readymade.
What we see in the object is real but at the
same time is fantastical.
She also plays with the viewers’ senses
by covering a tea set in animal fur and testing
what our culture will or will not accept as
usable or normal.
Therefore, Oppenheim interacts with both our
visual and physical senses.
Duchamp’s “Fountain” is a great example
of Dadaism art.
The artist brings up an idea of anti art through
using a readymade object.
By relocating a urinal into a museum environment,
Duchamp gives it a new meaning, even stating
that “art is something you piss on”.
He is breaking the preconceived notions about
art, saying that art can take any form, whether
it was created solely by the artist or manufactured
elsewhere.
He blurs the lines between the Dadaist ready
made, anti-art and conceptual art.
Smithson’s “Spiral Jetty” is an enormous
earthwork in the shape of a spiral built on
the Northeastern shore of the Great Salt Lake.
In this work, Smithson is rejecting a common
notion that a landscape must be painted.
His goal is to prove that a landscape can
be created literally; and his main tool is
time.
Over time the earthwork interacts with its
environment, a relationship that blurs the
boundaries between art and nature.
Therefore, by introducing a new method of
interacting with a landscape Smithson breaks
the boundaries between a painted landscape
and a created one.
In this untitled piece, Lee Bontecu is combining
sculptures and paintings.
She is challenging our perception of a painting
and how a piece can be understood differently
due to the viewer’s location and perspective.
If this piece is hanging on the wall, Bontecu
is expecting us to think of it as a painting,
however, when we step to the side, we realize
that the piece is actually three-dimensional
and can be considered a sculpture.
Therefore, Bontecu is re-examining art forms
by writing them in one piece.
By depicting comic book like images on a big
scale canvas, Roy Lichtenstein is saying that
low art can be elevated to the status of fine
art and can be equal to it.
In this way, Roy Lichtenstein is blurring
the boundaries between low art and fine art.
Similarly, Henri De Toulouse-Lautrec does
the same with “La Goulue” but this time
within Art Nouveau.
He introduced a new understanding of art – art
as advertising.
Therefore, he elevated low art to fine art.
Andy Warhol was pop-artist who often left
his audience guessing what the meaning was
behind his art work.
In “Campbell’s Soup Cans”, Warhol appropriated
images prevalent in popular culture and mass
media into his artwork, in a serialistic,
Minimalistic aesthetic.
He combines features pop art with the aesthetics
of Minimalism.
And because images of soup cans are so banal
and mundane, and are repeated so copiously,
he too combines low art with the status of
fine art by depicting it on a big scale canvas.
Warhol also works with the theme of semiotics
by collapsing the sign and signifier, and
blurring the lines between them.
Oldenburg was an artist who helped develop
the theme of semiotics.
He also follows the technique of Dali by depicting
hyperrealism in his artwork.
Due to the hyperrealism of the sculpture of
a huge hamburger the viewer faces a challenge:
at first he sees quite a realistic hamburger,
however its size, location and material composition,
make it clear that it is not a real hamburger.
He leaves us questioning whether or not his
artwork can actually be called a hamburger.
He too blurs the lines between sign and signified.
What is important about Joseph Kosuth’s
work “One and Three Chairs”, is that he
takes the idea of semiotics explored by Oldenburg
and brings it to the whole new level of exploration,
submerging the viewer fully into the theme.
Joseph Kosuth presents his viewer with three
objects: a real chair, a picture of a chair,
and a dictionary definition of a chair.
He, therefore, poses a question of how we
understand what a chair is?
How did we learn what a chair is?
And leaves the answer to his viewer, and muddies
the distinctions between all these dimensions
of a chair.
Our goal was to find an alternative exploration
of the theme of Peace and Security.
By referring to artists of the 20th century
we argue that peace and security lies within
unification of different factions.
We applied this philosophy to different fields
of art to provide an example of how unification
has already taken place in at least one area,
and how it has improved and strengthened the
world of art as a whole.
Should the notion of reducing boundaries be
applied to opposing factions of the human
race, much like it has been applied to the
varying schools of art, we imagine the world
will know peace.
