Status Updates From Art and Politics: Between P...

'But it was only during the First World War that art was viewed as a yardstick to measure national identity. This idea implied a well-defined distinction between (national) self and other, which, as we have seen, quickly resulted in ultimate confusion.'

'...only in an abstract and theoretical sense can purity be viewed as an artistic quality, because the meaning of an artwork depends on many different layers of interpretations.'

the new monuments in former communist countries often strikingly resemble each other; even poor countries don't skimp out on $$$ for them. 'their presence and festive inauguration are part of their political function: legitimizing a new political system or even a new nation, as well as the creation of a new sense of national bonding.'
not necessarily indicative of the nation's actual unity/political cohesiveness

post-fall of eastern bloc, diff countries/cities dealt w public monuments in a variety of ways - removal, replacement, creative appropriation, put in museums, left undisturbed, destroyed.
oftentimes, these sites were used in the 'invention of tradition.'
uzbekistan: Timur is their national symbol, statue of him on horseback in Tashket (used to me Marx), yet Timur is not even related to the uzbeks and was sadistic.

'Because of their "timeless" presence, in the long run monuments go unnoticed; they become a silent part of the everyday public environment, devoid of meaning.' however... 'A regime change questions the universality of existing monuments.'

'[Kara] Walker seems to imply that in a world where human relations are defined in terms of ownership and entitlement, no one escapes the violating and dehumanizing consequences.'
*nuance*~~~~

'...cultural-minority artists face two opposing pitfalls. When they comply with the demands of mainstream art and the international art market, they are expected to shake off their 'cultural provincialism,' but when they dismiss the universalist claims of the official art world, they tend to be pressured by their own community to conform to a static and normative sense of cultural identity...'

"Art is a part of our total responsibility for the world. Otherwise I don't see why we should make art." (ai weiwei)

cultural revolution -- complete break w the past/artistic traditions. 1957 'Anti-Rightist Campaign' against bourgeois influences in chinese society (for ex, euro infl.).
more nuanced with indigenous technique of *guohua*. those artists started to adapt to demands of art 'for the people/CCP', -- for ex. added Mao's poetry to a still life or titling a landscape 'Chairman Mao's Native Soil' (lowkey goes hard).

post wwii cold war era — modern art in usa was elitist/not appreciated by masses for a while, but was exported by the cia & state department in order to change everyone’s opinion of usa as imperialist racist etc, and this honestly worked esp in europe.
soviets saw modern art as decadent/bourgeois, socialist realism was the norm.
then science + tech started to become benchmark of progress + comp btwn nations

‘In the Soviet Union Picasso was identified as a bourgeois decadent artist; at international festivals, on the other hand, he was honored with the Stalin Peace Prize and other tokens of recognition. In the United States Picasso was celebrated as one of the spiritual fathers of ‘free’ and ‘democratic’ modern art, it to conservative critics and the FBI he was a subversive communist.’

racial theory extended to arts & culture in delineating “the degenerate”. reich chamber of culture decided which artists & art were ‘allowed’ though controversial and flimsy. Degenerate Art exhibit had more visitors than the “Great German”. lol. modern art said to be “communist and jewish” but most german modern artists were neither. and some were nazis too (emil nolde). everyone’s ridiculous.

‘…the campaigns against modern art also served a political objective: the creation of a collective enemy. Exactly because many people found modern art difficult to understand, it was relatively easy to expose it as a fraud.’

‘However, Rivera was not an opportunist. He always remained loyal to his fundamental principle: making art for the people, always the protagonists and positive heroes of his work.’

DR based as always. yeah, honestly get money from rockefeller & ford to make murals with lenin in them and marxist references and workers together. props.

~~wwi france & germany constant debates about art as symbol of their cultural superiority and marking the other as degenerate — in both countries modern artists were criticized by conservatives because they’re allegedly “representatives of enemy art” and not creating the national feeling/unity that was the professed duty of the artist at the time. even tho a lot of f&g art resembled the other. paradox always