Chapters 36 & 38

The Postmodern Turn

Chapter 36The Quest for •Racial Equality

•Gender Equality

The Quest for

Racial Equality

American History (1)1861-65 the Civil War, southern states secede from the Union and founded the Confederate States of America

1865-77 Reconstruction

1877 Segregationist Jim Crow Laws

Jim Crow Laws – Segregation – sharing facilities prohibited

The Harlem Renaissance: 1920s-1940s

During the 1920s, Harlem became the capital of black America, attracting black intellectuals and artists from across the country and the Caribbean.

Many of the greatest works sought to recover links with African and folk traditions.

A fierce racial conscious and a powerful sense of racial pride animated the literature of the Harlem Renaissance.

http://www.digitalhistory.uh.edu/database/article_display.cfm?HHID=443

Harlem by Langston Hughes

What happens to a dream deferred?

Does it dry up like a raisin in the sun? Or fester like a sore— And then run? Does it stink like rotten meat? Or crust and sugar over— like a syrupy sweet?

Maybe it just sags like a heavy load.

Or does it explode?

American History (2) 1924 Exclusionary immigration act

barred Asians 1941 Japan bombed Pearl Harbor

US entered WWII 1942 President Roosevelt ordered

internment of Japanese

Americans in camps

The Civil Rights Movement:1950s-1960s1954 School segregation banned

1955-1964 Negro Revolt (non-violent protests led by Martin Luther King, Jr.)

1964 the Civil Rights Act, banning segregation in public places

1965 the assassination of Malcolm X, dynamic leader of the Black Revolution, who rejected non-violence and advocated black nationalism

Martin Luther King, Jr. and Malcolm X met before a press conference. Both men had come to hear the Senate debate on the Civil Rights Act of 1964. This was the only time the two men ever met; their meeting lasted only one minute.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:MLK_and_Malcolm_X_USNWR_cropped.jpg

Political Art

Robert Colescott, Les Demoiselles of Alabama

Yasumasa Morimura, Portrait (Twins), 1988

Manet, Olympia, 1863

The Quest for

Racial Equality

Feminist Art

Cindy Sherman•Untitled Film Stills, 1995

Barbara Kruger

Chapter 38

Postmodernism1. After modernism?2. Contra modernism?

Differences (1)The modernist laments fragmentation while the postmodernist celebrates it.

Differences (2)Postmodernism rejects the

distinction between ‘high’ and ‘popular’ art which was important in modernism, and believes in excess, in gaudiness, and in ‘bad taste’ mixture of qualities.

Postmodern Literature(1) combines disparate styles in

works (references to other cultures and world views)

(2) quotes from various works (intertextality 互文性 )

Postmodern Literature(3) rejects traditional style in

favor of parodying writing (4) authors are often self-

conscious: address the reader, inject commentary worlds of author and reader blur

Postmodern Literature(5) questions the authoritative

interpretations of literary works

•questions whether a work exists in and of itself, or if the work only exists in its interpretations

Postmodern Literature(6) questions the absolute nature

of the meaning of language (7) metalanguage: works are ofte

n "about" language rather than simply use language to communicate ideas

ReferencesBarry, Peter. Beginning Theory.

2nd ed. Manchester: Manchester UP, 2002.

http://jan.ucc.nau.edu/~jsa3/hum355/readings/37/chapt37.htm

Jackson Pollock (19112-1956)

Process, uncertainty, change

"When I am in my painting, I'm not aware of what I'm doing. It is only after a sort of ‘get acquainted’ period that I see what I have been about. I have no fears about making changes, destroying the image, etc., because the painting has a life of its own. I try to let it come through. It is only when I lose contact with the painting that the result is a mess. Otherwise there is pure harmony, an easy give and take, and the painting comes out well."

Alchemy, 1947. http://www.guggenheimcollection.org/site/artist_work_lg_129_1.html

Eyes in the Heat, 1946. http://www.guggenheimcollection.org/site/artist_work_lg_129_5.html

Pop Art

Andy Warhol, Campbell’s Soup Can

Andy Warhol, Elvis

Andy Warhol, Mint Marilyn Monroe, 1962

Andy Warhol, Mao #91

Comic Strips

Roy Lichtenstein

Roy Lichtenstein

Assemblage

Richard Hamilton, Just What Is It That Makes Today's Home So Different, So Appealing?, Collage, 1956

Robert Rauschenberg, Tracer, 1963

Robert Rauschenberg, Retroactive I, 1964

Jasper Johns, Flag, 1954

“Using the designs of the American flag took care of a great deal for me because I didn’t have to design it, so I went on to similar things. . . things the mind already knows. That gave me room to work on other levels.” Jasper Johns

Duane Hanson

Suane Hanson, Tourist, 1970

Total Art

Smithson, Spiral Jetty, 1970

The End