Author Archives: Charmaine Charmant

A Nation in Suspense

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I really enjoyed Pinder’s article on biraciality in contemporary American art because it called my attention to race relations in the U.S. through describing what Pinder refers to as the “racial crossroads of the 20th century”.  By providing examples of drastically different notions of racial hybridity, she shows how the disparity of opinions leaves the nation in suspense, and delves into what representations of racial hybridity represents in contemporary America.  What I found most interesting was the biracial individual’s shift from tragedy to trendy in the eyes of the American people.  For example, in the 19th Century Tiger Woods would have been looked down upon due to his racial background whereas now, images of people like Tiger Woods that represent racial hybridity are viewed as symbols of unity amongst the American people.  Pinder also goes into the difficulty that people of mixed race backgrounds experience when trying to place mentally themselves within the fabric of western civilization: “the west divides its ability to comprehend good/evil and black/white, the way in which it makes oppositions in everything.  Not just simple oppositions but hierarchical, superior/inferior oppositions… so that one is always better than…” (394)  This part of the passage truly grasped my attention because it verbalized a way of thinking so deeply embedded within our society that I never even noticed or bothered to question.  This divisive comprehension can be seen below in Lorraine O’Grady’s piece The Clearing.

Lorraine O'Grady The Clearing

Pinder:  Pinder brings different notions of racial hybridity in contemporary America to the forefront and discusses what images of biraciality in contemporary art represent.

Waegner:  Waegner examines the trend of yellowface/blackface impersonation through Hip Hop art.

Pariah: An Alternative Representation of Black Femininity

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For this response I will focus on the film Pariah.  Pariah follows the tribulations that Alike, a young African American teenager who identifies as a lesbian, experiences as she becomes more comfortable with her sexuality in a predominately heteronormative society.  Pariah, defined as a rejected member of society or a person without status serves as the perfect word to depict the isolation that she experiences upon coming out to family and friends.  More importantly, the film’s depiction of Alike’s experience and its diverse representations of black femininity contests traditional views of black female sexuality.  This is done through Pariah’s relationships with other black women like her mother and sister who identify as heterosexual, and Abina and Laura who identify as homosexual.

With images of male dominance and female subordination pervading the African American community throughout the film, there is a sense of exclusion associated with identifying as queer.  The film also brings issues of the black female body to the forefront through Alike and her best friend Laura’s butch demeanors – something that was discussed in our reading from Black Womanhood.  Alike’s mother views this outward portrayal of masculinity as a disruption to social norms, and tries to impose heteronormative ideas of what a woman should look like upon her daughter.  Her refusal to acknowledge Alike’s lifestyle choices ultimately results in violence and leaves Alike in a state of homelessness after being rejected as a member of her own household.

Thompson:  Thompson contests distorted representations of the black female body through exploring and debunking the European stereotypes responsible for the misrepresentation of the black female body in art.

Shift From Exile to Diaspora

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Sima Shakhsari’s essay on how the war on terror increased the hyper visibility of queer Iranians via cyberspace delved into a lot of complex issues surrounding Iran and the country’s attitude towards homosexuality.  What I found most interesting about the piece was the exploration of the shift from exile to diaspora.  The juxtaposition of a backwards and traditional Iran and the fast paced, innovative Internet provided by Shakhsari helps us to understand the shift in depth.  As a result of the war on terror, the media was constantly covering Iran and information on Iranian queers became more visible.  This in turn gave them a stronger international presence and identity which before that point was denied as seen in instances like Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s visit to Columbia University where he declared “In Iran we don’t have homosexuals like in your country”.

Before the war on terror, this mentality of homosexuality as a non-existent factor within Iranian culture figuratively stripped Iranian queers of their Iranian identity not only within Iran but outside of Iran as well.  For example, although many queer Iranians living outside of Iran consider themselves exiles, “the Iranian exilic imaginations have incessantly excluded Iranian queers” (Shakhsari).  This is extremely important to note because Iran didn’t even fully acknowledge individuals of Iranian descent that identified as queer in their most negative image – exile.  Instead, Iranian culture placed “queer” in the image of Western civilization and attributes the queering of Iranian individuals as perversion from the West.

Identifying as a queer individual automatically makes an issue of sexual orientation political as we see in Arsham Parsi’s case.  “This situation is both a burden and a tremendous personal responsibility for me…I fully devote my labors toward achieving for myself and my fellow citizens in Iran the treasured dream and desire of so many millions around the globe…freedom.” (19, Shakhsari)  This sentiment coupled with the war on terror and the innovation of technology ultimately led to an increase in engagement, communication, and support for Iranian queers located outside of Iran – ultimately ushering in the shift from exile to diaspora.

Fraser: Bridging the Gaps

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The Museum Highlights selections really opened my eyes to the art world and its boundaries.  Many people, myself included, fail to realize how divisive the arts have become at the hand of professionalism and academia.  This is extremely important to note and I believe that groups like Kontext Kunst and artists like Andrea Fraser that dedicate themselves to bridging the gaps between writing, thinking, and making presented in the art world are admirable.  Fraser is able to do this through the interconnectedness of her writing, and performances.

One thing that stood out to me about Frasers project art is the way in which it critiques aspects of the culture of art oftentimes simply through representation.  Understanding these cultural tendencies is something that I came to learn through Fraser’s work.  For example, while reading chapter 9 of a performance where Jane Castleton leads a tour group through the Philadelphia Museum of Art, it became undoubtedly apparent to me who and what the Museum deemed important, as well as what type of people the Museum preferred and catered to.  Fraser sums up this notion beautifully in her description of Jane in the end notes where she states:

“as a volunteer, she expresses the possession of a quantity of the leisure and the economic and cultural capital that defines a museum’s patron class.  It is only a small quantity – indicating rather than bridging the class gap that compels her to volunteer her services in the absence of capital…yet it is enough to position her in identification with the museum’s board of trustees and as the museum’s exemplary viewer” (Fraser, 110)

Fraser:  Through the interconnectedness of her writing and performances, Fraser attempts to bridge the division between ‘writing’, ‘thinking’, and ‘making’ that the professionalization of the artist and intellectual created.

Taylor:  Taylor outlines the history of performance art and highlights artists significant to the genre including Abramovic, and Scheemann.

Chicana Art: “Breaking the Taboo on Sexuality”

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Latorre: Cultivated from a cultural group that initially wrote off gender and sexuality issues as specific to Anglo Americans, the innovative Chicana movement does not have nearly enough scholarly visibility as it should.

Lopez:  Lopez evokes the experiences of latina women through modernizing the Virgen de Guadalupe in her digital print entitled Our Lady.

After reading both pieces by Latorre and Lopez along with doing some more outside research of my own, I found the initial ambivalence of Chicana artists to identify with the feminist movement interesting.  A particular passage in Latorre’s piece comes to mind when thinking about this quandary: “Concerns over gender and sexuality were either relegated to the margins or completely silenced.  Many activists at the time, both male and female, held the perception that these were Anglo-American issues that would divide el movimiento and dilute its political effectivemness.” Latorre p.12

However, in the first few pages of Lopez’s piece Silencing Our Lady, we see that this belief is proven to be wrong.  In fact, it seems as though the activists use the excuse of political dilution to mask their real concern of bringing the issues of gender and sexuality within the community to light.  Unsurprisingly, we see this represented in the violent attitudes of men toward young women in reaction to the digital mural that portrayed female residents of the Estrada Courts Housing Projects entitled Las Four (below).

Source: http://www.rowan.edu/artbytes/abnhtm/art/alma.htm

Lopez’s digital piece Our Lady, which features a more contemporary, sexualized version of the Virgen de Guadalupe also sparked an intense debate spear headed mostly by male religious leaders.  Because this piece accentuates female strength and freedom through such an iconic religious figure, we see (as we did in the reaction to her Las Four piece) patriarchy’s attempt to censor and stifle anything that is not dominated by, or pleasing to men.

Black Art & the Promotion of Solidarity

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With a substantial rise in African American migration to Los Angeles during the twentieth century and an increase in civil rights and Black Power activism, the African American community in Los Angeles began growing stronger.  Simultaneously, black artists were creating art that symbolized and depicted their own as well as the experiences of those around them – many of which were represented in Now Dig This!  Art and Black Los Angeles, 1960 -1980.  Johnson believes that through promoting solidarity, the art in Now Dig This! “poses a problem for its audience” because it divides them into 2 categories: 1 group that identifies with the black experience, and another group that does not.  However, I do not view this as a problem at all.  How are black artists creating art fueled by emotions from events that took place in their lives any different from Picasso creating art during his Blue Period?  It isn’t.  The fact that these pieces of art can be identified with by a certain group of people is secondary, and should be treated as such.  One can not expect an entire audience to have the same feelings, or reaction towards a singular piece of art whether it promotes solidarity or not.  Art is meant to promote discussion, and these pieces do just that.

In his article reviewing the exhibit at MoMA, Ken Johnson hones in on a piece by Melvin Edwards and writes: “Such dualities would be enough on which to base judgement and interpretation were this a piece by, say, the white junk sculptor Richard Stankiewicz.  But it makes a difference to know that Mr. Edwards is African-American…”  The real problem lies here. The race of the artist shouldn’t take precedence over the art.

Here’s an assemblage piece featured in the Davis Museum that both readings reminded me of (Kienholz, Edward; Kienholz, Nancy Reddin Sawdy 1971):

Mixed media assemblage (car door, mirrored window, automotive lacquer, polyester resin, screenprint, fluorescent light, galvanized sheet metal)

Johnson:  Black artists unconsciously divide their audience by taking assemblage, an art form initially created as an expression of freedom from parochial social mores, and using it as a way to promote solidarity through their art.

Jones:  A cultural shift within the black community opened up the possibilities for African American artists and fostered artistic innovation which ultimately led to the West Coast becoming notable for the acceptance of assemblage in mainstream America (through its symbolism of the black struggle between the 1960s and 80s).

Raiford: In the 1960s and 70s, the Black Panther Party used photography to create an image for themselves and give the black revolution more visibility in the American public eye.

“Camp Life”: Japanese American Internment & Gender Roles

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“Camp Life” highlights the effect that the Japanese American Internment had on gender roles within the Japanese American community.  Ironically, imprisonment and the implementation of gendered spaces served as the primary factors behind the empowerment of Japanese American women at that time.  For example, something as simple as gendered dining facilities had major repercussions in the lives of Japanese American women – in this case, it eliminated the patriarchal “head of household” which in turn decreased the amount of control that men had over their wives and daughters.  The amount of domestic work that women were responsible for completing not only decreased, but also became a source of income for them as women were paid WRA wages.  Collaborative work also became a part of everyday life which allowed for women to meet new people and form friendships outside of the home – a luxury that wasn’t afforded to them pre-imprisonment.  More importantly, the economic independence that Japanese Americans experienced as a result of incarceration served as a way for non conformists like homosexual, bisexual, and queer individuals to explore their sexuality.