Fluxus
performance: selling of ideas
performance art slipped through commercialization
protest is betray, will become the next evil
Pandieton
performance
printing
installations: System of Display
protest as art
System of Display
how would framing system
mirror: bring outside world into frame
image: performance, animating dead image by looking in different angle.
BAND: acknowledge history of failure
Print Publication
Strategic Abstraction: 1960-1970
misread as strategic essentialism (Strategic essentialism is a strategy by which differences (within a group) are temporarily downplayed and unity assumed for the sake of achieving political goals.)
how use "black"
Saunder: black is a color (not a way of thinking)
BAM: "Black Is Beautiful", "Black Power"
Abstraction:
Use of White: white canvas - white power ideology (White is the final neutral color) But now we live in 21 centry with computers, the default color is black! (Black color are 0 in computer science)
black mirror: strategic essentialism to strategic abstraction
"Black Is Beautiful": painting insane black canvas after black canvas is too radical
black representation space: space for black abstraction
AfriCOBRA: Mimesis: where abstract and real meet Check out image: worry about need to explain image. Abstraction: people fear it goes too far - abstraction for abstraction's sake
"form of formlessness" Abstraction vs. Representation soul: boundary of conscious (not form); no individual can own. Black Fantastic: redundant word Black Abstraction: BAM made the words redundant. use black color as abstraction, experimental, but still black
Afrofuturism: a way to escape current situration. Dream of the good.
Sun Ra: black outer space; realism in abstraction. Black Light: core aesthetic energy. A different wavelength.
There is a violence when people lose right to be opaque.
Race Riot:
death and disaster series
Charles Moore
cut from original
repetition
red, blue, white
anti-form? or another form?
insisted that Moore's photographs had merely "caught his eye"
"business" was the best art - anti-form anti-commercial becomes another commercial (embrace instead of criticizing, which is why having no statement)
After World War II, as the undamaged land of America revived from the Great Depression, the ability to manufacture war supplies turned into another level of mass production of fast food, cans, and cokes. This began American consumerism. When competitive business models started to embrace automation to back consumerism up (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U69eMI1CjZs&ab_channel=HuntleyFilmArchives), there were pop artists who reflected about such automation as well. Some artists, on one hand, critiqued mass production, on the other hand, started to think about how to mass-producing art. Andy Warhol was one of them. In his autobiography, he was thinking about an algorithmic way to create art. (p96) He explicitly said that he wanted to "finish as a business artist" (p92). Especially in his work "Race Riot", we can clearly see his intent to assembly-lining art production through appropriation, repetition, and conceptualization.
Appropriation from the popular culture is one way Andy Warhol ran his art business. Although the idea of appropriation might have been new to the audience, none of the images of his "Campbell's Soup Cans" to "Marilyn Diptych" were under his own creativity. Besides appropriating the commercial goods, Warhol also appropriated from his office workers. After he was shot by Valerie Solanas, he was relieved when he realized his office could produce art without him. (92) In his office, the workers were more than laborers, but were encouraged to be the idea generators for Warhol's work. (99) In his own word, he wished to have a "kinetic business" (92) where he could just lie down and wait for the money to flow out from it. We can see such appropriation explicitly from "Race Riot" where Warhol appropriated from Charles Moore's photography. The appropriation in Dadaism is a form of protest to bring the mundane objects to the "high art" gallery by adding new ideas to the readymade. However, "Race Riot" added little meaning to the original Charles Moore's work as the photography itself is already an artwork. Therefore, such appropriation can only be explained as a way to efficiently mass-produce cheap art.
Repetition is also the key in Warhol's business art. In consumerism culture, while the assembly line method ensured the quality of every product, they lost their classical "aura" as they were all made the same perhaps by a cold machine instead of human labor. It was the loss of medieval-style craftsmanship that invoked many critiques. Many of Warhol's famous artwork, like "Campbell's Soup Cans" and "Marilyn Diptych", were critiques of the mass production of either items or movie stars. Although the uses of repetitions in many of Warhol's works were necessary, in "Race Riot", he most likely used repetitions not as a means of conveying ideas but as a means of another mass production: the mass production of art. Repetition was used to critique mass production by mimicking the assembly line process. However, the uprising in Birmingham wasn't mass-produced: they are not created by cold machinery. Instead, the original intention of the photography was to let the actual event, instead of machinery-typed text, reveal the truth that happened in Birmingham. Therefore, instead of creating new meanings, the repetition was there only to deemphasize appropriation and stress ownership of the artwork, much like what businesses do. After a while, repetition became Warhol's business copyright that nobody can own besides Warhol himself. In a sense, using repetition, Warhol successfully turned his art creation process into a business model.
The repetition in Warhol's business art can also be thought of as an expression of conceptualism. In "Race Riot", although the actual photography gives the audience a concrete story narration, the repetition, appropriation, and coloration can all carry their unique meaning beyond the content of the image. The unusual manipulation of the image can create additional value by invoking the audience's reflection. Ironically, the audience is often impressed not by the artist's original intention about the piece, but by overthinking about the artwork. Warhol realized that the value of an artwork can be created by misunderstanding: "If people never misunderstand you, ... you get bored with that" (p99). Therefore, conceptualism is built-in within Warhol's work by carefully preventing people from completely understand his work. "Race Riot", with three additional panels of the same photo colored in blue and red creates additional value just by invoking the audience's wonder. As long as the artist himself did not reveal any official interpretation to explain the meaning away, the artwork could not be hated because nobody can truly understand, with 100% certainty, Warhol's intention. While seemingly create opinions in all of his artwork, Warhol ran a successful business art by asserting no opinion on many of his artwork to prevent the inflation of ideas.
Warhol successfully applied effective strategy to mass produce business art through appropriation, repetition, and conceptualization. The critique of mass production becomes the new mass production. Controversial as it is, "Let it be!": I'd like to say. When one form of art occupies too much "cash", there must be another who rebels. Making business art is to disrupt the form brought by classical art and elitism. It tried to make art much like Coca-Cola where there exists no hierarchy: "You can be watching TV and see Coca-Cola, and you can know that the President drinks Coke, Liz Taylor drinks Coke, and just think, you can drink Coke, too." (p100-101). Pop art was created by the people (since they were appropriations from advertisements), and for the people (since they exhibit no deep meanings).
If the repetition does have meaning to it, it must have a different meaning than the repetition in most other Warhol's work which exemplified by "Tomato Soup Can" series. Therefore, the meaning isn't embedded in the image, but it is intentionally open for audience interpretation. Otherwise, repetition is simply there to mass produce an artwork for easy money.
Repetition
About Warhol:
Appropriation: Business as Art (p?)
Repetition and Automation:
Conclusion
p13: talk about president. He is very aware of class difference building in commercialism; airline stewardesses.
Appropriation
business as art
work as art
Repetition
9: computer would be a very qualified boss very scientific person
12: interpreter's imagination are worth more than artists' idea (it's your own idea that consumes you, which makes the art commericializable) - which is why "I take no position"
Hanke Chen (60-205 A) Critical Theory in Art III Paper #1 "Race Riot" as a Business Art
After World War II, as the undamaged land of America revived from the Great Depression, the ability to manufacture war supplies turned into another level of mass production of fast food, cans, and cokes. This began American consumerism. When competitive business models started to embrace automation to back consumerism up, there were pop artists who reflected on such automation as well. Some artists, on one hand, critiqued mass production, on the other hand, started to think about how to mass-produce art. Andy Warhol was one of them. In his autobiography, he was thinking about an algorithmic way to create art. He explicitly said that he wanted to "finish as a business artist." Especially in his work "Race Riot," we can clearly see his intent to assembly-lining art production through appropriation, repetition, and conceptualization. Appropriation from popular culture is one way Andy Warhol ran his art business. Although the idea of appropriation might have been new to the audience, none of the images of his "Campbell's Soup Cans" to "Marilyn Diptych" were under his own creativity. Besides appropriating the commercial goods, Warhol also appropriated from his office workers. After he was shot by Valerie Solanas, he was relieved when he realized his office could produce art without him. In his office, the workers were more than laborers: they were encouraged to be the idea generators for Warhol's work. In his own words, he wished to have a "kinetic business" where he could just lie down and wait for the money to flow out from it. We can see such appropriation explicitly from "Race Riot" where Warhol appropriated from Charles Moore's photographs. The appropriation in Dadaism is a form of protest to bring the mundane objects to the "high art" gallery by adding new ideas to the readymade. However, "Race Riot" added little meaning to the original Charles Moore's work as the photograph itself is already an artwork. Therefore, such appropriation can only be explained as a way to efficiently mass-produce cheap art. Repetition is also the key in Warhol's business art. In consumerism culture, while the assembly line method ensured the quality of every product, they lost their classical "aura" as they were all made the same by a cold machine instead of human labor. It was the loss of medieval-style craftsmanship that invoked many critiques. Many of Warhol's famous artwork, like "Campbell's Soup Cans" and "Marilyn Diptych," were critiques of the mass production of either items or movie stars. Although the uses of repetitions in many of Warhol's works were necessary, in "Race Riot," he most likely used repetitions not as a means of conveying ideas but as a means of another mass production: the mass production of art. Repetition was used to critique mass production by mimicking the assembly line process. However, the uprising in Birmingham wasn't mass-produced: it was not created by cold machinery. Instead, the original intention of the photograph was to let the actual event, instead of machinery-typed text, reveal the truth that happened in Birmingham. Therefore, instead of creating new meanings, the repetition was there only to deemphasize appropriation and stress ownership of the artwork, much like what businesses do. After a while, repetition became Warhol's business copyright that nobody can own besides Warhol himself. In a sense, using repetition, Warhol successfully turned his art creation process into a business model. The repetition in Warhol's business art can also be thought of as an expression of conceptualism. In "Race Riot," although the actual photograph gives the audience a concrete story narration, the repetition, appropriation, and coloration can all carry their unique meaning beyond the content of the image. The unusual manipulation of the image can create additional value by invoking the audience's reflection. Ironically, the audience is often impressed not by the artist's original intention about the piece, but by overthinking about the artwork. Warhol realized that the value of an artwork can be created by misunderstanding: "If people never misunderstand you, ... you get bored with that." Therefore, conceptualism was built-in within Warhol's work by carefully preventing people from completely understanding his work. "Race Riot," with three additional panels of the same photo colored in blue and red creates additional value just by invoking the audience's wonder. As long as the artist himself did not plan to reveal official interpretation to explain the meaning away, the artwork could not be hated because nobody can truly understand, with 100% certainty, Warhol's intention. While seemingly creating opinions in all of his artwork, Warhol ran a successful business art by asserting no opinion on many of his artwork to prevent the inflation of ideas. Warhol successfully applied effective strategy to mass produce business art through appropriation, repetition, and conceptualization. The critique of mass production becomes the new mass production. Controversial as it is, "Let it be!": I'd like to say. When one form of art occupies too much "cash," there must be another who rebels. Making business art is to disrupt the form brought by classical art and elitism. It tried to make art much like Coca-Cola where there exists no hierarchy: "You can be watching TV and see Coca-Cola, and you can know that the President drinks Coke, Liz Taylor drinks Coke, and just think, you can drink Coke, too." Pop art was created by the people (since they were appropriations from advertisements), and for the people (since they exhibit no deep meanings).
Bibliography Warhol, Andy. “Work.” In The Philosophy of Andy Warhol (From A to B and Back Again), 87–103. Harcourt, 1975.
Carbone, Teresa. “Exhibit A: Evidence and the Art Object.” In Witness: Art and Civil Rights in the Sixties. Eds. Teresa A. Carbone and Kellie Jones, 193–221. New York City: The Monacelli Press, 2014.
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