SOC 4433: Culture and Society (Halley)

Drawing on literary, art historical and historical studies, this essay collection explores the complex encounter between culture and politics within Surrealism. The Surrealist movement was one of the first cultural movements to question explicitly the relation between culture and politics, and its attempt to fuse social and cultural revolution has been a critical factor in shaping our sense of modernity; yet few books have been published that directly address this aspect of the movement. Although the historical importance of Surrealism is beyond doubt, politics plays an ambiguous role in the movement: it indisputably pervades the work, informing its endeavours, yet it seems to evade direct articulation.

A radically new history of French surrealism by a brilliant young art historian. In contrast to the orthodox view that surrealism slid into a terminal decline after the 1930s, Alyce Mahon shows that the movement was instead transformed in the war and postwar years as the Surrealists redefined and extended their interests in social crisis, political engagement, transgressive art, myth, the occult, and the erotic. Through "the politics of Eros" the Surrealists attempted to shatter the repression intrinsic to bourgeois society by appealing to individual desire as a route to political consciousness and action. Dr. Mahon analyzes the conception and organization of their four international exhibitions from 1938 to 1965, showing how they evoked a three-dimensional world of dream, desire, and sexual pleasure. This intellectual tour de force draws on interviews with such key artists as Jean-Jacques Lebel, Mimi Parent, and Jean Benoit, and uses primary sources to advance our knowledge of the work of the better-known Surrealists, from Hans Bellmer to Meret Oppenheim. The Second World War, the Algerian War, and May 1968 are related in new ways to surrealism as a major countercultural force throughout this critical period in French history. By documenting the ways in which the Surrealists used sound, lighting, special effects, and performance art to create a living, theatrical environment, Dr. Mahon sheds new light on topics central to understanding art in our time. Illustrated with key works of art as well as rare contemporary photographs and documents, the book is destined to become a classic work on one of the most popular and controversial art movements of the twentieth century. 189 illustrations in color and black and white.

Through the analysis of narratives, paintings and objets surréalistes by Breton, Aragon, Dalì, and others, Malt examines how the object emerges as psychologically and historically marked in the surrealist context, functioning as both fetish and fetishized commodity. Responding to recent debates about the role of the uncanny and the representation of the body in surrealist art and literature, Malt's study offers new perspectives on familiar works such as the paintings of Salvador Dalì as well as illuminating relatively neglected ones such as Breton's poèmes-objets.

This volume examines the intersection of Hegelian aesthetics, experimental art and poetry, Marxism and psychoanalysis in the development of the theory and practice of the Surrealist movement. Steven Harris analyzes the consequences of the Surrealists' efforts to synthesize their diverse concerns through the invention, in 1931, of the "object" and the redefining of their activities as a type of revolutionary science. He also analyzes the debate on proletarian literature, the Surrealists' reaction to the Popular Front, and their eventual defense of an experimental modern art.

Touch suggests a broad range of physical, intellectual, and emotional connections that serve to undermine the dominance of vision in histories of modernism. By exploding notions of the very nature of art, the artists considered in this beautifully illustrated monograph introduced fundamentally new conceptions of subjectivity and engagement for the modernist era. While offering an entertaining and engaging history of dada and surrealism, Please Touch presents a persuasive argument highlighting the role of “tactility,” which it defines as a decentralized, fragmented, and intimate form of knowing. In this compelling volume, Janine Mileaf offers the first full-length consideration of Marcel Duchamp’s readymades and their profound legacy in the transatlantic context of dada and surrealism. This book embraces a broad range of art objects: consumer items such as the urinal and bottlerack that Duchamp “sneaked” into art exhibits; flea-market assemblages fabricated by his interwar avant-garde successors Man Ray, André Breton, Salvador Dalí, Meret Oppenheim, and others; and the bricolage boxes of American surrealist Joseph Cornell. Please Touch is an intriguing exploration of some of the twentieth century’s most important art and artists that will appeal to a broad range of art historians and interdisciplinary scholars.

Jacquelynn Baas is director emeritus of the University of California Berkeley Art Museum and Pacific Film Archive. She previously served as director of the Hood Museum of Art and is the author, coauthor, or editor of numerous publications.

This text explores the impact of political activism on contemporary art. It introduces a variety of artists who are advocating political and social reform on a local or a global scale.

Contemporary art can be baffling and beautiful, provocative and disturbing. This pioneering book presents a new look at the controversial period between 1945 and 2000, when art and its traditional forms were called into question. It focuses on the relationship between American and Europeanart, and challenges previously held views about the origins of some of the most innovative ideas in art of this time. Major artists such as Jackson Pollock, Jasper Johns, Yves Klein, Andy Warhol, Louise Bourgeois, Cindy Sherman, and Damien Hirst are all discussed, as is the art world of the last fifty years. Important trends are also covered including Abstract Expressionism, Pop Art, Minimalism, Conceptualism,Postmodernism, and the art of the nineties.

Almost without exception, studies of the avant-garde take for granted the premise that the influential experimental practices associated with the avant-garde began primarily as a European phenomenon that in turn spread around the world. These ten original essays, especially commissioned for Not the Other Avant-Garde, forge a radically new conception of the avant-garde by demonstrating the many ways in which the first- and second-wave avant-gardes were always already a transnational phenomenon, an amalgam of often contradictory performance traditions and practices developed in various cultural locations around the world, including Africa, the Middle East, Mexico, Argentina, India, and Japan. Essays from leading scholars and critics-including Marvin Carlson, Sudipto Chatterjee, John Conteh-Morgan, Peter Eckersall, Harry J. Elam Jr., Joachim Fiebach, David G. Goodman, Jean Graham-Jones, Hannah Higgins, and Adam Versényi-suggest collectively that the very concept of the avant-garde is possible only if conceptualized beyond the limitations of Eurocentric paradigms. Not the Other Avant-Garde is groundbreaking in both avant-garde studies and performance studies and will be a valuable contribution to the fields of theater studies, modernist studies, art history, literature, and music history. "Joins the growing field of critical and transnational theories on the arts. . . its grounding in live performance and its foregrounding of the performative human body presents a new theoretical paradigm that is pathbreaking." --Haiping Yan, University of California, Los Angeles James M. Harding is Associate Professor of English at Mary Washington University. He is author of Adorno and "A Writing of the Ruins": Essays on Modern Aesthetics and Anglo-American Literature and Culture and editor of Contours of the Theatrical Avant-Garde: Performance and Textuality. John Rouse is Associate Professor of Theater at the University of California, San Diego. He is author of Brecht and the West German Theatre.

The increased use of digital tools for political activism has triggered heated debates about the effectiveness of digital campaigns for political change and feminist causes. While technology's immediacy and transnational reach have broadened the potential impact of activism, it has, at the same time, complicated the goals, materiality, and consumption of feminist actions. In Awkward Politics, Carrie Smith-Prei and Maria Stehle suggest that awkwardness offers a means of engaging with twenty-first century feminist activism by accounting for the uncertainty of popfeminist moments and movements, its sometimes illegible meanings, affects, and aesthetics. By investigating transnational media ranging from popfeminist performance art, music, street activism, blogs, and hashtags to literature, film, academic theory, and protests, the authors demonstrate that viewing activist art through the lens of awkwardness can yield a nuanced critique. By developing awkwardness into a theoretical tool for intervention, a key concept of feminist politics, and a moving target, this innovative study dramatically alters the ways in which we approach activism, its forms, movements, and effects. It also suggests a broad range of applicability, from social movements to the academy. Breaking new ground through the intersections of technology, consumerism, and the political in popfeminist work, Awkward Politics highlights the urgency of feminist politics and activism.

By placing emerging artists in their political and social contexts, this collection attempts to confront the new activist scene that has arisen in the Russian art world during the past years. The recent explosion of protests in Russia--often with their very purpose being to decry the lack of artistic freedom--is a symptom of a fundamental change in culture heralded by Vladimir Putin's first election. This shift was precipitated by the change to a highly commercial, isolated world, financed and informed by oligarchs. In response, the Russian contemporary art scene has faced shrinking freedom yet an even more urgent need for expression. While much of what is emerging from the Moscow art scene is too new to be completely understood, the editors of this volume seek to bring to light the important work of Russian artists today and to explicate the political environment that has given rise to such work. Post-Post-Soviet? will feature both criticism by writers and scholars, as well as dialogues with artists. Contributors include Boris Kagarlitsky, Ekaterina Degot, Keti Chukhrov, Boris Buden, Artur Zmijewski, and others.

Documenting and describing the emerging "performative democracy," the first new art form of the twenty-first century. Today political protest often takes the form of spontaneous, noninstitutional, mass action. Mass protests during the Arab Spring showed that established systems of power--in that case, the reciprocal support among Arab dictators and Western democracies--can be interrupted, at least for a short moment in history. These new activist movements often use online media to spread their message. Mass demonstrations from Tahrir Square in Cairo to Taksim Square in Istanbul show the power of networked communication to fuel "performative democracy"--at the center of which stands the global citizen. Art is emerging as a public space in which the individual can claim the promises of constitutional and state democracy. Activism may be the first new art form of the twenty-first century. global aCtIVISm (the capitalized letters form the Latin word civis, emphasizing the power of citizens) describes and documents politically inspired art--global art practices that draw attention to grievances and demand the transformation of existing conditions through actions, demonstrations, and performances in public space. Essays by leading thinkers--including Noam Chomsky, Antonio Negri, Peter Sloterdijk, and Slavoj Zizek--consider the emerging role of the citizen in the new performative democracy. The essays are followed by images of art objects, illustrations, documents, and other material (first shown in an exhibition at ZKM Center for Art and Media, Karlsruhe) as well as case studies by artists and activists. Essays by Can Altay, Sruti Bala and Veronika Zangl, Tatiana Bazzichelli, Olaf Bertram-Nothnagel, Angela Bonadies, Robin Celikates, Korhan Gümüs, Dietrich Heißenbüttel, Bruno Latour, Sarah Maske, Ugo Mattei, Graham Meikle, André Mesquita, Marcus Michaelsen, Walter D. Mignolo, MTL, Antonio Negri, Dimitris Papadopoulos, Vassilis Tsianos and Margarita Tsomou, Rita Raley, Arman and Arash T. Riahi, Martha Rosler, Peter Sloterdijk, Karl-Peter Sommermann, Guido Strack, Jackie Sumell, Zixue Tai, Tatiana Volkova, Christoph Wachter and Mathias Jud, Dan S. Wang and Sarah Augusta Lewison, Peter Weibel, Ahmad Zatari, Bo Zheng, Ragip Zik, Slavoj Zizek. Interviews with Ammar Abo Bakr and Ganzeer, Younes Belghazi and Hadeer Elmahdawy, Erdem Gündüz, Joulia Strauss