landmark into
dissect election for wheat one of
contemporary art
today and is going to talk briefly about
this setting for the creation of
argument post work hearing
that is the pirie
right after the end of world war two
starting nineteen forty-five now
i realize it's a good fifteen years
before
nineteen sixty
however they're are important
developments and really canonical
figures to emerge in this post war
period both in america
in your opinion just he had
there are influential and
they developed a contemporary art so we
have to kenneth starr at the beginning
and get a little bit about prehistory of
contemporary art and so that's where
we're starting today
this sort of postwar period
in fact there are several things that
need to think about what we think about
what happens in the world
art in the immediate aftermath of world
war two
first of all will be looking at the
effects uh... in talking a little bit
about
the effects of world war two itself
modern society
moderating effects it has certainly
important for america
europeans pay
we also have to consider
some important pre-war intellectual and
artistic
currents and things that were happening
in the nineteen twenties
nineteen-thirties
when her respond what were to actually
because of some of the changes wrought
by world war two bright even more to the
forefront so we'll be talking about some
important theorists
myself the shop lots of any meaning an
entire greenberg
also be talking about
surrealism in some of the ideas of
surrealism that becomes so important to
the
postwar period
and that's really what will be talking
about today in the next couple of
lectures
next week will be talking about the
effects of right at this very closely
with your eating in america
and especially this will of
abstract expressionism this this
movement in that
forties and fifties that is hugely
important to understand the development
of our team
temporary period
anson related things are going on in
europe and japan that really for today
which is going to talk about
the effects of world war two
and some of the pre-war intellectual in
art currents that are important in this
connected explosion of stuff that
happens right after the war
so and let's see
wal-mart background
world war two w_w_ ite
one or two was eight local conflict its
starts in the nineteen thirties
escalates through the nineteen thirties
until
but i think
forties that has become a truly
global conflict
really out here
worldwide casualties and
these were caused by a variety of things
from direct
warfare too
famine to bombs being dropped on
civilian populations
if you think about
if you remember
september eleventh two thousand one in
most of us probably do
in your remember how devastating feeling
was uh...
in that immediate aftermath of september
eleventh the loss of life the
destruction
property
multiply that by a factor of i don't
even know how much worldwide casualties
from world war two
that is worldwide deaths
between dj
civilians and military populations
roughly seventeen million people
so this means for
is about
forty seven million people he died
either directly because of the war or
because of famine and disease that are
stirred up by the board
so you can imagine
let him out of casualties and i mention
this
you may wonder what this has to do with
art really
this is the psychological background in
which party is going to be created in
the post-war period it's going to have a
week influence
series in the ideas that artists in the
post-war period taken up in ninety track
other things that happened during world
war two that really const people too
reassess
and turn in new directions for their
personal lives and for art as well
the holocaust this is the deliberate
murder
guesstimates are about six million
people i'm probably a bit more than that
but you include
aa
all this so called undesirable
populations that did not see strikes
again rita
this really cost
you know he dribbles into intellectual
world
trying to figure out how human beings
could do this anything from one another
the development of the ad and i'm very
fiercely dropped by the u_s_ in japan
contact in hiroshima
nagasaki
which rocks
destruction on a scale they had not ever
been seen previously so this brings up
all sorts of questions about the use of
technology
you know whether technology is good or
bad
adhesive vinyl chemical weapons during
world war two
another thing that
causes people to question
what society in technology have been
doing last fifty years what happened
and anything that happens in world war
two is just massive numbers of people
are displaced from here
problems and there are refugee camps all
over
all over europe especially
so there's a m
appearance
questioning and doubt in trauma
instability
uh...
insecurity
people feeling a little bit like the
world has been forever changed
began to think about how
deeply september eleventh affected all
of us and i'm not downplaying september
eleventh it was a terrible tragedy but
that was three thousand people
and uh... handful of blocks of lower
manhattan compared to
enormous
territories of europe in japan that were
destroyed
compared to the loss of seventy two
million people around the corner
so you can just sort of magnified that
affected september eleven cabinet us
in the living memory
uh... by
a huge factor to think about the effect
of world war two
anon the populations of europe japan the
united states
but after effective world war two
courses the transit talent he read
robinson
and that would be dead paid dominant
issue in international politics for the
next fifty years
the rise of russia and china as to tell
if your income statement and getting
back to much of the sports but it is
something that is an important part of
then general development of society in
period in which contemporary art
this is a nice graphic gives you a
visual for
how many people were lost in world war
two
bars they're indicate the wrong number
of millions of people and yes you can
see
and the soviet union in china
lost really and phenomenal memory of
people
germany an
lost a phenomenal number of people
conceit
briar member of millions of people
and then if you look at the blue number
look at that
the bluegrass bar here will tell you the
percentage of that country's population
that lives lost cell
for example
soviet union lost almost twenty four
million people
translates to about thirteen percent of
the population sample
germany lost
what's it almost seven and a half
million people
that was about and percent happened
so we're talking about it
pretty significant
impact on all of these countries
and as you can now is the u_s_
was quite fortunate in this whole
equation and that we did not lose that
many people or
that much percentage of the population
but that's because primarily
the people who were affected by this war
were soldiers there weren't very many
american civilians involved in war
because it was mostly in europe and
japan
and i'll say it does have a few photos
that will
give you a little bit of a sense of the
scale of destruction this was a
aftermath of the air raid in england
during the course elvis's german bombs
being dropped in the civilian population
and england
that there were lots of times trapped in
germany to and in fact
very terrible destruction among the
german civilian population
due to fire bombings that just basically
burns cds to the ground so that mrs
you know suffering that happens across
the board in europe and
into p
so this is this
downtown area grossman
in japan after the dropping of the adam
time interest rate two square miles
completely obliterated
everything in its wake
uh... and this is the kind of thing that
is on people's minds at the end of the
water and it will be
we kind of thing that brings up
questions about how do you
cult of the world in which this kinda
stuff happens
how do you find me in this kind of the
world
what do you do with tradition a
tradition produces this kind of stuff
where you go for solace and comfort
where was gone in all of this and for a
lot of people the answer would be there
would be no god who could let these
things happen
and that's important because that
produces there's a whole school
of existential philosophy becomes very
important as it influence on argument
goes for appearing in ads all coming out
of this environment
add to that
simmons courtney's
things have been going on in the pre-war
period that because in the way to people
have been changed by the war are going
to become incredibly
important to the way to think about
meaning and are in the post-war period
and will just talk briefly about
fourteen portent
things or people are ideas that come
from the pre-war period that will
influence contemporary art
marcel did show up in the content of the
ready-made
what event you mean
and his idea about the effectively
cannibal reproduction works of art
country drag in his idea about the
difference between
high art
decom album ka
event guard art and
kits or just
the kind of smock it is produced but i a
m
by masses for the masses advertising art
and
cheesy stuff
uh... as well as
a pre war
not make it really goes back to about
the turn of the century really becomes
popular in the twenties and thirties
this time
and philosophy movement minister realism
which is very interested in ideas of the
sub conscious
first things first
we will be familiar with this subject
this is what
they always talk about in my classes
this is the shouldn't
so-called clinton olive
uh...
are mike as you can see sided dated
there
are not nineteen seventeen the fountain
actually created by marcel de shop
marcel dish up was
a french born artist who was
became an american basically we can move
to america
because of world war one so he'd been a
mysterious it was in the states
in the nineteen teens and
became a very important player in the
modern
you may wonder
because if you look at this you probably
recognize
this is probably not something that are
not sculpted himself it's actually a
urinal that's been placed on its side on
a pedestal and called and spoke sir
you may think
that's all well and good
that really what is that all about
well i'll tell you
marcel michel
was part of h
in the nineteen teens known as the
society at independent parties
missus side he was trying to get away
from the tradition
and they decided that
it would be great to have a show that
was not jerry were anybody who was a
member of the society for independent
artists
could pay their yearly membership and
submit whenever they saw fit to become
part of the annual exhibition of the
society
the idea of lies to get rid of tradition
and
tried and academic critics into really
do step that was moving to encourage
people to do new kinds of art
dish up was quite a bit of a game player
you might say
and so he thought
politically that they're really you know
that they're gonna put their money where
their mouth is and sell
went to philadelphia bought here and all
the plumbing supply shock
mailed it
to new york to the society for
independent artists with a check for
five dollars that was the yearly fee to
be a member of the society
and saying this is my sculpture
fountains i would like to submit it for
the society of independent artists
exhibition
and actually cost quite a
ruckus
when it got there the society for
independent artists
jury committee
by the i_r_s_ and exhibition committee
emerging reviewer just kind of
organizing exhibition
of which marcel the shop was a member
decided they couldn't possibly exhibit
this thing this was a really working art
this wasn't journal that was placed on
inside unit cars and pull kind of debate
and scandal in the art world
but what it did was get really brought
some ideas and issues to the forget
continued to be at play even today in
contemporary art so let me tell you a
little bit more
about what my studies have said
when this scandal broke he actually came
to the defense of the unknown young
artist are not nobody knew
and deb published some
essays in this
some r_j_ reynolds talking about the
significance of something like that
one of the places where it
decent defended the fountain was in a
publication called the blind man this is
an add on card
art publication that list
published by alfred steve that's the
photographer and steve let's went ahead
and
made a photograph of the fountain
to accompany this article that day
my salvation published in the blind him
here is this
photograph that
stiglitz took and the accompanying
estate
any kind of u_s_a_ marcel michel said
you know
the important thing here it is
that and artist has made excellence and
made a decision
and it is the artists
in his job
to make a see the world in the wings
cell
if you look at this
fountain in all you can see is something
thirty-four shameful something
eunice for people to
piston
and the fault lies with the dealer and
not with the object itself
he said
when i look at this act think of the
statue of buddha
i think in the virgin mary
i think of all these associated shape so
i think it's something beautiful
at decides he said
the only great artwork in america has
produces here planning and her bridges
and so this is a quintessentially
american fork part
creating a new thought for the optic we
can get your see something in a new way
and
the viewer being responsible for
creating a meeting at work of art these
are all ideas have become very very
prominent in the contemporary parkour
me and let you can see this is how the
photo was crops before it was published
in the blind man
so you can see that it's very close up
at one p u of the fountains so that it
has that kind of shape
there's a buddhist culture underwriters
for comparison rights as the you can see
all right there's a tendency in shape if
you think of the virgin mary within
failed covering her head and shoulders
as you can sort of see where he's
kind of making these analogous
comparisons between the fountain in
these other art objects
and here's an excerpt from the blind man
from that article that decide wrote
whether mr much with his own hands me
the fountain and not has no importance
he chose it
he took an ordinary article of life
placed it so they see useful
significance disappeared under a new
title in point of view
he created a new thoughts
for the object
and that is where we're getting to the
heart of something that will be so
important in the contemporary world this
idea that what an artist does is not
just turnout beauty that can be
accomplished by
other means it's actually creating
dot were objects it's giving new meaning
to means it's the artistic vision that
is the most important thing it's not
what they are not something is pretty
so here's another example of the shots
work this is a
uh... so-called ready-made that he arab
rectified ready made that he created in
the teens
that call bicycle wheel and as you can
see it is a bicycle wheel
at
now tonight's u_s_ still
this is what
like to do he
believed in the idea
the concept
uh... was what made something the work
of art
you liked
the ready-made object
taking something out of its familiar
context putting it into something new
the concept the idea
that is what's important not be
actual object itself and he also
visits firm believer in this idea that
it's the viewer who's responsible for
completing the work of art
the viewer cast too
give the work of art meeting
it's not something that's self contained
in the work of art it's not something
that's recreated by artists
these are ideas that become crucially
important to them
contemporary art world from
forty-five armored until today and so
it's important to be
slightly mir with
pioneering work at the shop in the
nineteen teens
here's another one of his
ready-made for this is that you can see
snow so i will be purchased at a
hardware store he engraved on hindle
in advance of a broken arm
and that became his rectified ready me
and hear another quote from dish up
about the idea of the ready-made
the choice was made
based on eight reaction of visual
indifference a total absence of good or
bad taste
and complete anesthesia
so he's a guy who's trying to reject
tradition in going to some new
directions for art
just like with world war two morena
after effects of world war one
and mister andriessen at the south is a
member of
whose real feeling of you know
to help tradition tradition hasn't
gotten us anywhere we need to go
somewhere new with parts and so that's
where this kind of idea
starts to percolate
and there is just another example of the
shop in his games playing
this is due shot dressed up as his
female alter ego process d
at the same because some of the in
france it sounds like
errol's
sale at the
which just translates
to loved that's life and so here again
amin
i don't think we're as
easily shocked about maybe is people
were in the nineteen teens and twenties
syllabi command dressing up like a woman
may not
be that much of a a
stretch for us but this is really quite
shocking when he did it in the nineteen
twenties
and he often use this
female altered ego who was also premium
is it
and to try to get away from traditional
notions of art
and here's another example of the
shopping his break with tradition in his
plane with the idea high art and kits
and as we'll see you later
and things like walter benny means
thoughts about
what happens when a work of art becomes
reproduced so much that it
almost loses its meaning
and this is his
postcard from the blue
without the mona lisa on which he used
ron as you can see mustache and a tape
across the bottom decide has written
letters
l age oval q
if you think letters l_h_ bulky in
france the way they're pronounced in
france
eyelash loking
that sounds it's a prominent four
whereupon on a sentence the sentence
is translates into serious
she has a hot s
and i sent to you
she has a hot acts
at
this is
another way of
deflating tradition
by the nineteen teens i mean the mona
lisa was already an incredibly
venerated
art object
it had been the subject on inattentive
bath to get a couple assassination
attacks were factory acid i'm going to
be sent
uh... inhibit
acquire such a great significance in dc
high culture you know as an important
part object
that decide when it's just sort of
puncture that idea
and by making me
rectified reading the post card
making fun of the way that people
salivate over the moon and lisa
and there's of course the region along
the seine
and here is that for and for the monthly
says it is a balloon now as you can see
behind bullet-proof glass
and so the people can't
get up to a continued damage to it that
there it is everybody trying to get
close to it
end here
to some of the ways that mona lisa has
been
dealt with in popular culture over
and centuries right
and just playing around with this very
very high comic
and even
were all had as crack at the moment he
sets in there she is reproduced hundreds
of times scheme and screen printing
painful
one thing i'd like you do after hearing
this lecture is to go to the readings
for this weekend read the handout that
hasn't excerpts from clement greenberg
and walter bending the
and to think about these questions
what is kits according to clement
greenberg
howdy modern appropriations of the mona
lisa fit into this idea camps
how do you these kind of versions of the
mona lisa
illustrate benny means claims about
the effect of making up the reproduction
on the work of art how does that
destroyed the aura of the work of art to
be massively reproduced and incredibly
fun
so those are
things are posted on blackboard
including shrinks to the entire readings
for from clinton
greenberg involved then you need and i
asked me to read the whole thing just
read that
handout at mister interested
uh... but this is something to think
about this week because these are ideas
that are going to keep percolating
throughout the time
and here at the red greenberg another
thing to think about it
one thing that he really liked was
art that was truly
car high art
and one thing he says it distinguishes
high artforum
crafts
okay are hired fruitcakes hired from
popular culture is
how easy it is to understand
how much do you need to be schooled
intriguing
phiri to really understand what's going
on in the picture and looking at these
two
from nineteen eighty years apart i think
you can probably guess which one of
these would classify as kids one which
one plastic part cleaning read
okay self
who talked a little bit about the sound
of his ideas at the ready made
i've mentioned greenberg and then you
need in your view reading more about
them this week
one other important prewar trans to
consider
before we wrap up in that is
his pre-war
art movement known as to realism
here i've got on the
slide for you
a famous definition of what's your
realism is fine with leading serb
realistic dining on treatment home
uh... surrealism
was a philosophical an artistic movement
that embraced the idea above
getting rid of all of your
civilized
uh... ego all of your
lessons that you've learned about
suppressing year internal desires
and getting back to agreement baseline
antics self almost like getting rid of
all your culture to get back to your
desert brain
uh... not filtering out anything
this was thought to be
an achievable goal
that the surrealists were trying to
figure out how to do u in music
poetry
and philosophy
get rid of all this tradition
get rid of all of this extraneous stuff
and get back to you
i kind of off
free verbal
pre-civil live self
there to really main ways of
trying to go about that in the visual
arts one is represented here we were
kids one miro who is a
artists from barcelona spain
this is just one of many of his painting
spam
he did painting and drawing in this
style bearing the scoop technique known
as automatic dr
where he would
basically
they can't assert piece of paper
close his eyes and start tracing
designs about trying to think about what
they were close his eyes and even look
at the campus and i'm scribble on the
campus or on the piece of paper
when he was done
or felt he was done in the open his eyes
and look at what he had there
and then
tried to pick out
the sub conscious symbols that he had
been drawing without meaning to draw
and that is where these p_d_'s originate
is in these
commits squiggles
and doodles that are done sub
consciously many would go back and look
well that was a little i can i borrow of
it looks like a star
well it looks like a star
so all these kinds of
almost
elemental or primitive symbols
that he would try to pick out from
the them
doodles that he had created subconscious
so this is one way of trying to get at
the expression of the sub conscious that
this area was increased and that is this
idea
automatic
drawing our automatic
painting and that's something that will
see in the post-war period that people
take up and environment
the other way
to try to stupid the subconscious and
surrealist movement was to make
visually convincing pictures that
represent things that couldn't possibly
be and really the poster boy for this
version of surrealism in salvador dali
also it happens from the same time
reduce pain that salami rose from from
catalonia
so here's probably dolly's most famous
painting the persistence of memory
where as you can see he's using staples
cool techniques
very atmospheric usa perspective
very realistic looking textures but to
create anything that we know couldn't
possibly be
right that kind of
hot water bottle of a face deflated
they're laying on the ground
pin this very weird alien looking
landscape with the melting pot faces all
of this meant to be symbolic out stuff
that's going on and all these sub
conscious
although it's it digitally recognizable
picture it's at the place
none of us have ever been it's been
inside it dot needs three
this'll be another way to do you sir
realism
that um...
will have some influence on the post
work here
what will be talking about next time
when we meet is the aftermath are what
happens in
the aftermath of world war two
specifically and will start by looking
at new york and then lots of love at
eureka
look at two p
uh... american really becomes the center
of the postwar art world for a number of
reasons the first of which is just that
america becomes the kind of transcendent
economic and political superpower
in the wake of world war two for a
variety reasons
lots of people who had been important
players
in the content
contemporary art in the pre-war period
will move to new york
uh... and they will take their
philosophies with them and that will
become the new at the center of
cutting-edge theory and cutting-edge
technique in
contemporary art
and so that's what we'll talk about when
we meet next time
