ARTHI 6C Lecture Notes - Lecture 19: Apartheid Museum, Sharecropping, Maya Lin
Tribute in Light - commemorating the Twin Towers, marking the anniversary of
9/11
Temporary: only up for 24 hours
○
Site-specific piece
○
•
1960 vs. 1980 vs. 1989 vs. 2000
All various starting points as a means to labelling "contemporary art" as a
category
○
Provisional dates attached to certain social movements or moments of
historical importance
Not everyone's beginning of contemporary art is the same… this
idea would be called "contingency"
§
○
Contingency: a future event or circumstance that is possible but cannot
be predicted with certainty
One set of dates in one part of the world does not apply universally
(due to cultural context, for instance)
§
EX: 9/11 (2001)
There was celebration because it was the end of the century,
but then everything changed overnight
□
The year 2000 essentially became erased and everyone
remembers the start of the new century beginning with 9/11
(contingent starting date)
□
§
EX: Arab Spring (2010-11)
§
○
Recall Fin de siècle = end of the century
○
•
Keith Haring
Manhattan Penis Drawing 1978
Depicting Twin Towers as erect penises
§
In hindsight, this isn't funny anymore
§
○
•
Memorializing
What are the pressures of representing the present as it is still being
lived?
○
What are the pressures of representing the recent historical past?
○
How do artists represent the past? Who gets to speak?
○
Memorializing: finding ways to come to terms with the recent past and/or
historical past
○
•
Maya Lin
Chinese American architecture student
○
Design chosen in a national competition at the age of 21
○
Vietnam Veteran's War Memorial 1982
Large triangular black granite slabs dug into the ground
Polished so that you can see your reflection against the
memorial
□
§
Level with the ground from one side and you cannot see the
memorial itself
§
People were upset because this memorial is dark, and not made of
white marble
§
Takes up 2 acres
§
Names inscribed in the memorial wall of those who have passed
away and served
§
Related to minimalist principles
Large geometric shape on a large surface in a public area□
Meant to blend in with the landscape around it □
§
People leave offerings and human remains there. In 1994, the Park
Service began collecting offerings and housing them in a warehouse
§
○
Faced a lot of racism and hatred because she was an Asian woman
○
•
Counter-Memorial
Counter = opposite
○
A memorial made in protest to the original memorial
○
Frederick Hart, Three Soldiers Memorial 1984
People believed Maya Lin's memorial was "vaginal" and feminized
war
§
Using racially sensitive figures
A black, Latino, and white man in combat together□
§
Placed right next to Lin's memorial
§
Self-representation
§
○
•
National Museum of African American History and Culture (MONUMENT)
Architect: David Adjaye
Black and British
§
○
Opened September 24, 2016
○
First building done in copper and bronze in Washington DC National Mall
○
Focus on the black experience in America
○
•
Monument
Monument: a statue, building, or other structure erected to
commemorate a notable person or event
○
Monumental: great in importance, extent, or size
○
Monumentality: massive or imposing architecture
○
•
Statue of John Carlos, Tommie Smith, and Peter Norman•
Thomas Jefferson statue
Standing with a stack of bricks
○
Each brick commemorates the name of one of his slaves at Monticello
○
Importance of naming to bring recognition to anonymous people from the
past
○
•
The National Memorial for Peace and Justice 2018
Montgomery, Alabama
○
Commemorating the history of terror lynching in the south between 1915
and 1940 (Jim Crow Era, pre-civil rights)
○
Aiming to create a space for healing
○
Terror lunching resulted from the following:
A wildly distorted fear of interracial sex
§
Lynchings in response to casual social transgressions
§
Lynchings based on allegations of serious violent crime
§
Public spectacle lynchings
§
Lynchings that escalated into large-scale violence targeting the
entire African American community
§
Lynchings of sharecroppers, ministers, and community leaders who
resisted mistreatment
§
○
Plates outside as dark reminder of blood from lynchings as rainwater runs
down the rusty plates
○
•
Visceral Experience
Characterized as proceeding from instinct (deep inward feelings) rather
than intellect
○
Triggering an emotional reaction in the viewer
○
Sometimes related to the concept of catharsis
○
Catharsis: the process of releasing and thereby providing relief from
strong emotions (i.e. feeling better after crying)
○
•
Apartheid Museum - Johannesburg, South Africa•
Empathy
The action of understanding, being aware of, being sensitive to, and
vicariously experiencing the feelings/thoughts/experience of another of
either the past or present
○
•
Memorial vs. Monument
Memorial
Structure, sculpture, statue, site, or other work intended to serve as
a remembrance of a histroical event or notable person
§
Commonly associated with death and observation of loss
§
EX: Hiroshima Peace Memorial Park
§
○
Monument
Often celebratory
§
Structure, statue, sculpture, site, or other work commemorating an
important historical event or notable person
§
Commonly associated with a celebration and recognition of the life
of a notable figure of the importance of a historical event
§
EX: Washington Monument
§
○
•
The Names Project AIDS Quilt 1987
Commemorating those who died from AIDS
○
Forming community
○
Utilizes many ideas from the 60s, 70s, and 80s to get its message across
○
It is a form of public art
○
Example of collective art practice
○
NOT site-specific, permanent work, but its installation is
ephemeral/temporary
○
Immersive and requires viewer attention
○
Uses ideas borrowed from minimalism: modularity (interchangeable
forms) and seriality (repetition) but REJECTS ideas such as lack of personal
or expressive content
○
•
Memorial Mania
An expression of public feeling
○
Historical obsession with monumentalizing and memorializing important
events
○
Over time, multiple viewpoints of the same event have become more
socially acceptable, even welcomed
○
According to Doss, today's memorials seek to address collective grief,
shame, and anger
○
Grief: often seen in the temporary, site-specific memorials
○
Shame: often seen in memorials to groups deeply wronged by society and
long overlooked
○
Anger: in vandalism to memorials considered inappropriate to viewers or
people who disagree
○
•
Threshold
An entrance, portal, gate, doorway, gateway
○
The magnitude or intensity that must be exceeded for a certain reaction
or phenomenon, result, or condition to occur or be manifested
○
EX: Pardall Tunnel "Hesperus is Phosphorus" 2015
Abstract expression using techniques of minimalism and light
§
○
•
Trans
Latin for "across" "beyond" "through"
○
Related to the threshold
○
Transcend: beyond or above the range of normal or merely physical
human experience
○
Transitory: momentary, fleeting, passing
○
Transgender: denoting or relating to a person whose sense of personal
identity and gender doesn't correspond with their birth sex
○
Transnational: extending or operating across national boundaries
○
•
Lecture 19: After 9/11 Memorials and Monuments
Thursday, June 7, 2018
10:58 AM
Tribute in Light - commemorating the Twin Towers, marking the anniversary of
9/11
Temporary: only up for 24 hours
○
Site-specific piece
○
•
1960 vs. 1980 vs. 1989 vs. 2000
All various starting points as a means to labelling "contemporary art" as a
category
○
Provisional dates attached to certain social movements or moments of
historical importance
Not everyone's beginning of contemporary art is the same… this
idea would be called "contingency"
§
○
Contingency: a future event or circumstance that is possible but cannot
be predicted with certainty
One set of dates in one part of the world does not apply universally
(due to cultural context, for instance)
§
EX: 9/11 (2001)
There was celebration because it was the end of the century,
but then everything changed overnight
□
The year 2000 essentially became erased and everyone
remembers the start of the new century beginning with 9/11
(contingent starting date)
□
§
EX: Arab Spring (2010-11)
§
○
Recall Fin de siècle = end of the century
○
•
Keith Haring
Manhattan Penis Drawing 1978
Depicting Twin Towers as erect penises
§
In hindsight, this isn't funny anymore
§
○
•
Memorializing
What are the pressures of representing the present as it is still being
lived?
○
What are the pressures of representing the recent historical past?
○
How do artists represent the past? Who gets to speak?
○
Memorializing: finding ways to come to terms with the recent past and/or
historical past
○
•
Maya Lin
Chinese American architecture student
○
Design chosen in a national competition at the age of 21
○
Vietnam Veteran's War Memorial 1982
Large triangular black granite slabs dug into the ground
Polished so that you can see your reflection against the
memorial
□
§
Level with the ground from one side and you cannot see the
memorial itself
§
People were upset because this memorial is dark, and not made of
white marble
§
Takes up 2 acres
§
Names inscribed in the memorial wall of those who have passed
away and served
§
Related to minimalist principles
Large geometric shape on a large surface in a public area□
Meant to blend in with the landscape around it □
§
People leave offerings and human remains there. In 1994, the Park
Service began collecting offerings and housing them in a warehouse
§
○
Faced a lot of racism and hatred because she was an Asian woman
○
•
Counter-Memorial
Counter = opposite
○
A memorial made in protest to the original memorial
○
Frederick Hart, Three Soldiers Memorial 1984
People believed Maya Lin's memorial was "vaginal" and feminized
war
§
Using racially sensitive figures
A black, Latino, and white man in combat together□
§
Placed right next to Lin's memorial
§
Self-representation
§
○
•
National Museum of African American History and Culture (MONUMENT)
Architect: David Adjaye
Black and British
§
○
Opened September 24, 2016
○
First building done in copper and bronze in Washington DC National Mall
○
Focus on the black experience in America
○
•
Monument
Monument: a statue, building, or other structure erected to
commemorate a notable person or event
○
Monumental: great in importance, extent, or size
○
Monumentality: massive or imposing architecture
○
•
Statue of John Carlos, Tommie Smith, and Peter Norman•
Thomas Jefferson statue
Standing with a stack of bricks
○
Each brick commemorates the name of one of his slaves at Monticello
○
Importance of naming to bring recognition to anonymous people from the
past
○
•
The National Memorial for Peace and Justice 2018
Montgomery, Alabama
○
Commemorating the history of terror lynching in the south between 1915
and 1940 (Jim Crow Era, pre-civil rights)
○
Aiming to create a space for healing
○
Terror lunching resulted from the following:
A wildly distorted fear of interracial sex
§
Lynchings in response to casual social transgressions
§
Lynchings based on allegations of serious violent crime
§
Public spectacle lynchings
§
Lynchings that escalated into large-scale violence targeting the
entire African American community
§
Lynchings of sharecroppers, ministers, and community leaders who
resisted mistreatment
§
○
Plates outside as dark reminder of blood from lynchings as rainwater runs
down the rusty plates
○
•
Visceral Experience
Characterized as proceeding from instinct (deep inward feelings) rather
than intellect
○
Triggering an emotional reaction in the viewer
○
Sometimes related to the concept of catharsis
○
Catharsis: the process of releasing and thereby providing relief from
strong emotions (i.e. feeling better after crying)
○
•
Apartheid Museum - Johannesburg, South Africa•
Empathy
The action of understanding, being aware of, being sensitive to, and
vicariously experiencing the feelings/thoughts/experience of another of
either the past or present
○
•
Memorial vs. Monument
Memorial
Structure, sculpture, statue, site, or other work intended to serve as
a remembrance of a histroical event or notable person
§
Commonly associated with death and observation of loss
§
EX: Hiroshima Peace Memorial Park
§
○
Monument
Often celebratory
§
Structure, statue, sculpture, site, or other work commemorating an
important historical event or notable person
§
Commonly associated with a celebration and recognition of the life
of a notable figure of the importance of a historical event
§
EX: Washington Monument
§
○
•
The Names Project AIDS Quilt 1987
Commemorating those who died from AIDS
○
Forming community
○
Utilizes many ideas from the 60s, 70s, and 80s to get its message across
○
It is a form of public art
○
Example of collective art practice
○
NOT site-specific, permanent work, but its installation is
ephemeral/temporary
○
Immersive and requires viewer attention
○
Uses ideas borrowed from minimalism: modularity (interchangeable
forms) and seriality (repetition) but REJECTS ideas such as lack of personal
or expressive content
○
•
Memorial Mania
An expression of public feeling
○
Historical obsession with monumentalizing and memorializing important
events
○
Over time, multiple viewpoints of the same event have become more
socially acceptable, even welcomed
○
According to Doss, today's memorials seek to address collective grief,
shame, and anger
○
Grief: often seen in the temporary, site-specific memorials
○
Shame: often seen in memorials to groups deeply wronged by society and
long overlooked
○
Anger: in vandalism to memorials considered inappropriate to viewers or
people who disagree
○
•
Threshold
An entrance, portal, gate, doorway, gateway
○
The magnitude or intensity that must be exceeded for a certain reaction
or phenomenon, result, or condition to occur or be manifested
○
EX: Pardall Tunnel "Hesperus is Phosphorus" 2015
Abstract expression using techniques of minimalism and light
§
○
•
Trans
Latin for "across" "beyond" "through"
○
Related to the threshold
○
Transcend: beyond or above the range of normal or merely physical
human experience
○
Transitory: momentary, fleeting, passing
○
Transgender: denoting or relating to a person whose sense of personal
identity and gender doesn't correspond with their birth sex
○
Transnational: extending or operating across national boundaries
○
•
Lecture 19: After 9/11 Memorials and Monuments
Thursday, June 7, 2018
10:58 AM
Document Summary
Tribute in light - commemorating the twin towers, marking the anniversary of. All various starting points as a means to labelling "contemporary art" as a category. Provisional dates attached to certain social movements or moments of historical importance. Not everyone"s beginning of contemporary art is the same this idea would be called "contingency" Contingency: a future event or circumstance that is possible but cannot be predicted with certainty. One set of dates in one part of the world does not apply universally (due to cultural context, for instance) There was celebration because it was the end of the century, but then everything changed overnight. The year 2000 essentially became erased and everyone remembers the start of the new century beginning with 9/11 (contingent starting date) Recall fin de si cle = end of the century. Memorializing: finding ways to come to terms with the recent past and/or historical past. Design chosen in a national competition at the age of 21.
