Sayre2e ch39 integrated_lecture_pp_ts-150680

Copyright ©2012 Pearson Inc.
American minister and civil rights leader Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., waves
to the crowd of more than 200,000 people gathered on the Mall during the
March on Washington after delivering his “I Have a Dream” speech,
Washington, D.C. 1963, August 28.

Map: The city of Birmongham, Alabama.

Faith Ringgold. God Bless America. One of a series of 20 paintings called
The American Peopledone between 1963 and 1967 that focused on racial
conflict and discrimination. 1964.
31" × 19”.

Black Identity
What factors contributed to changes in African-American self-
definition in the 1960s?
• Sartre’s “Black Orpheus” — The growing sense of ethnic identity
among African-American’s was influenced by Sartre’s “Black Orpheus”
and the emphasis of existentialism on the inevitability of human
suffering and the necessity for the individual to act responsibly in the
face of that predicament.
• Ralph Ellison’s Invisible Man — This novel was instrumental in
introducing existentialist attitudes to an American audience. The most
vital realization of the novel’s narrator is that he must assert his
blackness instead of hiding from it.

• Asserting Blackness in Art and Literature — The collages of
Romare Bearden depict the black experience. The poet and playwright
Amiri Baraka demonstrates a sense of a single black American identity,
one containing the diversity of black culture within it. The violent Watts
riots in Los Angeles reflected the growing militancy of the African-
American community.
• Discussion Question: In what way did black artists articulate black
identity?

Wilfredo Lam. The Siren of the Niger. Signed LR in oil. 1950.
51" × 38-1/8”.

Jeff Wall. After Invisible Man by Ralph Ellison, “The Preface.” Edition of 2.
1999-2000.
75-1/4" × 106-1/4" × 10-1/4”.

Romare Bearden. The Dove. 1964.
13-3/8" × 18-3/4”.

The Vietnam War: Rebellion and the Arts
How did artists respond to the Vietnam War?
• Kurt Vonnegut’s Slaughterhouse-Five — Antiwar sentiment was
reflected in the arts in works primarily about earlier wars, World War II
and Korea, as if it were impossible to deal directly with events in
Southeast Asia. The fatalism of Slaughterhouse-Five mirrors the sense
of pointlessness and arbitrariness that so many felt in the face of the
Vietnam War.
• Artists Against the War — Claes Oldenburg’s Lipstick (Ascending)
on Caterpillar Tracks targeted the university administration of Yale.
The Art Worker’s Coalition was an antiwar organization. They
professed the view that museums embodied the establishment politics
that had led to the war.

• Conceptual Art — A strategy designed to undermine the art
establishment emerged—making art that was objectless, art that was
conceived as either uncollectible or unbuyable, either intangible,
temporary, or existing beyond the reach of the museum that was felt to
be supporting the war. Heubler’s “January 5-31, 1969” was an
exhibition that consisted of its catalog but no objects.
• Land Art — One of the most famous of works designed specifically to
escape the gallery system, a site specific work, is Smithson’s Spiral
Jetty. Heizer’s Double Negative draws attention to the difference
between the relative brevity of human time and the vastness of
geological time. The temporary installations of Christo and Jeanne-
Claude evoke time’s passing and the fragility of human experience.

• The Music of Youth and Rebellion — Given the involvement of
American youth in the antiwar movement, it was natural that rock and
roll helped to fuel the fires of their increasingly passionate expressions
of dismay at American foreign policy. Rock was the musical idiom of a
youthful counterculture that embraced sex, drugs, and rock’n’roll.
Posters such as Six Days of Sound by Bonnie MacLean became
emblems of the era. The Woodstock Festival has become legendary.
• Discussion Question: Describe some of the significant imagery of
Rosenquist’s F-111 and how this imagery fueled controversy.

Claes Oldenburg. Lipstick (Ascending) on Caterpillar Tracks. 1969.
23'6" × 24'11" × 10'11”.

 Closer Look: James Rosenquist, F-111
MyArtsLabChapter 39 – Multiplicity and Diversity

James Rosenquist. Closer Look: Rosenquist's F-111. 1964-65.
10' × 86’.

James Rosenquist. Closer Look: Rosenquist's F-111. Installation view.
1964-65.
10' × 86’.

Ron Haeberle, Peter Brandt, and the Art Workers’ Coalition. Q. And
Babies? A. And Babies. 1970.
24" × 38”.

Robert Smithson. Spiral Jetty. Great Salt Lake, Utah. 1970, April.
3-1/2' × 15' × 1500’.

Michael Heizer. Double Negative. Mormon Mesa, Overton, Nevada. 1969-
70.
1500' × 50' × 30’.

Christo and Jeanne-Claude. Running Fence. Sonoma and Marin Counties,
California. 1972-76.

Bonnie MacLean. Six Days of Sound. 1967, December 26-31.

John Paul Filo. Kent State—Girl Screaming over Dead Body. Published as
the cover of Newsweek on May 18, 1970. 1970, May 4.

High and Low: The Example of Music
How did “high” culture and “popular” culture coexist in the musical
world?
• Gyorgy Ligerti and Minimalist Music — Minimalist music was
inspired by advances in electronic recording and production
innovations. Composers transformed the simple elements with which
they began into dense, rich compositions. Ligerti developed a rich, but
much more minimal, brand of polyphone—which he called
“micropolyphony.”
• The Theatrical and the New Gesamtkunstwerk — The music
for Wilson’s play Einstein on the Beach was composed by Philip Glass.
The “doubling” introduced in this work is another facet of postmodern
experience. Laurie Anderson most fully realized the Gesamtkunstwerk
ideal with her multimedia piece, United States.
• Discussion Question: Explain Brecht’s critique of the Gesamtkunstwerk
and its influence.

Robert Wilson. Einstein on the Beach. Performed by the Lucinda Childs
Company. 1976.

Laurie Anderson. Laurie Anderson performing “O Superman,” from United
States, II. 1983.

The Birth of the Feminist Era
How did the feminist movement find expression in the arts?
• The Theoretical Framework: Betty Friedan and NOW —
Friedan’s The Feminine Mystique rejects modern American society’s
construction of women. She founded the National organization for
Women, the primary purpose of which was to advance women’s rights
and gender4 equity in the workplace.
• Feminist Poetry — The work of both Anne Sexton and Sylvia Plath
explored the difficulties that women faced in determining an identity
outside the patriarchal construction of “woman.”
• Feminist Art — Many women artists were insistent that their work be
approached in formal, not feminine terms—that is in the same terms
that the work of men was addressed. Judy Chicago’s collaborative
work, The Dinner Party, announced the growing power of the women’s
movement. Eleanor Antin consistently explored the construction of
female identity in contemporary American society. Cindy Sherman cast
herself in a variety of roles, all vaguely recognizable as stereotypical
female characters in Hollywood and foreign movies, television shows,
and advertising.

• Discussion Question: Discuss feminist themes in art.

Eva Hesse. Ringaround Arosie. 1965, March.
26-5/8" × 16-3/4" × 4-1/2”.

Judy Chicago. Pasadena Lifesavers, Yellow No. 4. Series of 15. 1969-70.

Judy Chicago. The Dinner Party. 1979.
48' × 48' × 48' installed.

Eleanor Antin. My Kingdom Is the Right Size, from The King of Solana
Beach (one of 11 photographs and two text panels comprising the whole).
1974.
6" × 9”.

Cindy Sherman. Untitled Film Still #35 (from the series of 69 shot between
1977 and 1980). 1979.
10" × 8”.

Richard Prince. Untitled (Cowboy). Edition of two. 1989.
50" × 70”.

Questions of Male Identity
How did male self-definition come into question?
• It stands to reason that if female identity is not essential but socially
constructed, the same should hold true for men.
• Richard Prince was one of the first artists to address this theme as
seen in his advertisements of cowboys, specifically the Marlboro Man.
• If Prince’s cowboys represent the macho side of American male
identity, the gay rights movement would play a dramatic role in
challenging such American attitudes about the nature of masculinity.

Andy Warhol. Lance Loud, from America. 1985.

Christo and Jeanne-Claude. Continuity & Change: The Global Village: The
Umbrellas, Japan – USA. 1984-91.

Sayre2e ch39 integrated_lecture_pp_ts-150680

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