07S/01E:367 Seminar Current Issues in Art Education: Identity, Social Justice, Activism

Associate Professor: Dr. Rachel Williams

14NH

319-335-3012

Rachel-williams@uiowa.edu

Texts: The Interventionists: Users' Manual for the Creative Disruption of Everyday Life [Hardcover]

By: Nato Thompson (Editor), Gregory Sholette (Editor)

Conversation Pieces: Community and Communication in Modern Art [Paperback]

By: Grant H. Kester

Selections from

Johnathan Glover, “Humanity: A moral history of the Twentieth Century”

Suzi Gablik, “What is Art For?”

Suzanne Lacy, “Mapping the Terrain: New Genre Public Art”

Carol Becker, “The Subversive Imagination; The artist, society, and Social Responsibility”

Howard Risatti, “Postmodern Perspectives”

We will also be reading articles from the following websites each week

Community Arts Network: Activism Essays

http://www.communityarts.net/readingroom/archivefiles/activism_all2/index.php

inventio: ''I Don’t Buy It'': Student Resista...

http://www.doiiit.gmu.edu/inventio/main.asp?pID=spring05&sID=butin&tID=13

GOAL: The goal of this course is for students to study and create art which functions as something other than art for art’s sake. As a group we will examine issues through the visual arts related to gender, war, globalization, public health, poverty, fair housing, fair trade, torture, politics, sexism, ageism, immigration, etc. We will discuss identity and artistic agency in the current context of everyday life as a catalyst for change and activism.

OBJECTIVES:

· Students will read and discuss Kester’s book as well as texts from various authors on the subject of art, community, and activism.

· Students will produce an art piece based on covert or overt actions/pieces related to a topic of their choice. These works must be thought provoking and/or manifest measurable change in people’s opinions or actions with regard to the chosen topic.

· Students must document their production process and record feedback based on the dialog their work sparks

· Students will research and present a series of artists, philosophers, and critics to their peers throughout the class

· Students will produce one lesson plan that is language/literature related as part of a human rights and language/visual arts webpage project.

· Students will write a paper that outlines the topic of their lesson plan(s) and artwork. They will also produce a one-page fact sheet for their peers.

· Students will receive a copy of all the lesson plans produced as a result of this class

· Students will keep a detailed artist’s journal with sketches and journal entries related to the readings

· Students will create one final paper (10 pages at least) about their experience and ideas as an artist/ teacher/ or critic during this class. This paper will be reflexive, descriptive, and will be underpinned by a theoretical framework.

For a detailed explanation of student rights and responsibilities see the student handbook

http://www.clas.uiowa.edu/students/academic_handbook/ix.shtml

Ideas for final art project:

Public Storytelling

Graffitti

Mail

Collaborative Journals

Graphic Novels (to be distributed)

Murals

Posters to be distributed

Performance Art in a public setting

Sound works to be recorded and distributed or projected in a public space

Interventions

Photo journalism to be published

Documentary Film short

Zines (to be distributed)

Mass produced Stickers or flyers

Class schedule

January 17

Introduction, in Conversation Pieces and the Forward in The Interventionists as well as “Trespassing Relevance”

pp. 67-78 in Post Modern Perspectives

intro in Women of the World Catalog

Pick an artist/ arts group from the following list to research

WochenKlausur
Adrian Piper

Ursula Burke

Suzanne Lacy

Littoral Arts

Ala Plastica

Stephen Willats

Helen and Newton Harrison

Dawn Dadeaux (LENORE)

Ultra Red

Jay Koh

Inigo Manglano-Ovalle

Artists Placement Group

Research one of these artists to present to the class on Jan 31

Jan 23-Field Trip to CSPS to see Women of the World exhibition

Chapter 1 in Conversation Pieces for Feb. 7

Research one of the following people

Clive Bell

Roger Fry

Immanuel Kant

Michael Fried

Clement Greenberg

Figure out how they would answer the following question

What is art?

What is not art?

References For Chapter 1 (These are for you to look over so that you can understand who and what Kester refers to):

http://www.uel.ac.uk/londoneast/gallery/loraine_leeson/#AoC

http://www.uel.ac.uk/londoneast/gallery/loraine_leeson/

http://www.varoregistry.com/whiteread/

http://www.bbc.co.uk/works/s4/wread/subjinfo.shtml

http://www.gutenberg.org/etext/16917

(FREE DOWNLOAD OF CLIVE BELL’s , Art

Kant’s Critique of Judgment (preface& explanation)

http://philosophy.eserver.org/kant/critique-of-judgment.txt

http://www.english.ccsu.edu/barnetts/kant.htm

Image of Millais “Bubbles”

http://cgfa.sunsite.dk/millais/p-millai10.htm

Information on Bloomsbury Group

http://cal.jmu.edu/aleysb/Bloomsbury.htm

William Powell Frith

http://www.goodallartists.ca/william_powell_frith.htm

George Elgar Hicks

http://www.tate.org.uk/servlet/ArtistWorks?cgroupid=999999961&artistid=255&page=1

Harriet Martineau

http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/Wmartineau.htm

Lawrence Alma Tadema

http://www.goodart.org/artoflat.htm

About Clement Greenberg

http://www.gadflyonline.com/9-2-01/art-greenberg.HTML

http://homepage.newschool.edu/~quigleyt/vcs/mp_sum.html

About Michael Fried

http://www.jhu.edu/~jhumag/0698web/arts.html

Donald Judd

http://www.guggenheimcollection.org/site/artist_bio_70.html

Robert Morris

http://www.guggenheimcollection.org/site/artist_bio_115.html

Robert Smithson

http://www.spiraljetty.org/

http://www.robertsmithson.com/index_.htm

January 31-Presentations on artists-discussion-

February 7-cover the avant-garde in art and discuss Bell, Fry, Greenberg, Fried, Kant

Read pp. 12-54 in Postmodern Perspectives

READ THE FOLLOWING ARTICLE:

http://www.artistsineastlondon.org/08_house/04text.htm

February 14 Discuss Reading from Last week and chart ideas chronologically

WHAT TOPIC/PROBLEM/ISSUE WILL YOUR SERIES COVER?

(In your journal)

Read Chapter 2 in Conversation pieces and Touch Sanitation from the Art in community webpage-see link below

http://www.communityarts.net/readingroom/archivefiles/2002/09/touch_sanitatio.php

Also read Chapter 14 in Theory in Contemporary Art Since 1985

pp.182-186

References:

Thierry deDuve

http://home.netvigator.com/~jasperl/r%60tdd.htm

The Artists Placement Group

http://www.tate.org.uk/learning/artistsinfocus/apg/chronology.htm

About Thomas Crow

http://www.ihc.ucsb.edu/events/event_files/past/_fall2002/crow/

http://www.acls.org/op10crow.htm

Joseph Kosuth

http://www.the-artists.org/ArtistView.cfm?id=8A01F7FB-BBCF-11D4-A93500D0B7069B40

Marcel Broodthaers

http://www.the-artists.org/ArtistView.cfm?id=8A01F18C-BBCF-11D4-A93500D0B7069B40

Chris Burden

http://the-artists.org/ArtistView.cfm?id=6F93F60D%2DAE6B%2D4DA5%2D814AF901FC398D94

Vito Acconci

http://www.eai.org/eai/artist.jsp?artistID=289

(see seedbed-funky stuff)

Dan Graham

http://www.eai.org/eai/artist.jsp?artistID=403

Adrian Piper’s Catalysis

http://www.citypaper.com/arts/story.asp?id=3996

Catalysis III" (1970), is a photo documentation of the sullen-faced young artist walking down a crowded city street. Around her neck hangs a sign that reads WET PAINT. In this and similar pieces, Piper calls attention to her altered self, and it's curious to consider whether it's more disturbing that some people notice or that others seem completely oblivious.

http://www.newmuseum.org/more_exh_a_piper.php

--In 1970 Piper embarked on her seminal Catalysis series in which she physically transformed herself into an odd or repulsive person and went out in public to experience the frequently disdainful responses of others. These explorations into xenophobia involved such activities as covering her clothing with sticky, wet paint while shopping at Macy's. Though photographs are all that remain of the Catalysis series, the work itself focused on the interaction between the artist and the public, and more specifically, on the reaction of the individual to Piper's presence.

Allan Kaprow

http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Acropolis/5422/kaprow.html

James Turrell

http://www.pbs.org/art21/artists/turrell/

Mierle Laderman Ukeles-see article

Thierry deDuve

http://home.netvigator.com/~jasperl/r%60tdd.htm

Stephen Melville

http://www.rochester.edu/in_visible_culture/issue1/melville/melville.html

Tony Smith

http://www.askart.com/askart/s/tony_smith/tony_smith.aspx

http://www.nga.gov/education/classroom/new_angles/act_smith_geometry.shtm

Robert Wilson

http://www.robertwilson.com/bio/bioMaster.htm

Antonin Artaud

http://www.antoninartaud.org/home.html

Richard Serra

http://www.pbs.org/art21/artists/serra/

Judy Baca (SUPER COOL!)

http://www.judybaca.com/

Hans Haacke

http://www.the-artists.org/ArtistView.cfm?id=8A01F55A-BBCF-11D4-A93500D0B7069B40

David Harding

http://www.davidharding.org/index.php

Conrad Atkinson

http://www.conradatkinson.com/index_intro.html

David Hume

http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/hume/

Jean Francois Lyotard

http://www.sociologyonline.co.uk/post_essays/PopLyotard.htm

February 28-In class see James Turrell in Art 21 Season I (Spirituality) --talk about chapter 2

Begin to think about your series-Bring in examples of artists who work in a similar way or have tackled a similar topic as the one you chose

Read Chapter 3 in Conversation Pieces

Chapter 6 in Post-structuralism and Post-modernism

Read 54-66 in Postmodern Perspectives –Jurgen Habermas

Have all of this read and digested by March 21

References for Chapter 3:

Viktor Shklovsky

http://www.centerforbookculture.org/dalkey/backlist/shklovsky.html

http://www.centerforbookculture.org/context/no2/shklovsky.html

Roman Jacobson

http://www.mnsu.edu/emuseum/information/biography/fghij/jakobson_roman.html

http://www.marxists.org/reference/subject/philosophy/works/ru/jakobson.htm

Osip Brik (not much here)

http://osip-brik.biography.ms/

http://www.mastersofphotography.com/R/rodchenko/rodchenko_osip_brik_full.html

Bertolt Brecht

http://www.kirjasto.sci.fi/brecht.htm

http://research.haifa.ac.il/~theatre/brecht.html

Mark Rothko

http://www.nga.gov/feature/rothko/rothkosplash.html

Barnett Newman

http://www.the-artists.org/ArtistView.cfm?id=239B6290-C5CF-11D4-A93800D0B7069B40

Hegel’s aesthetic ideas

http://www.questia.com/PM.qst?a=o&d=102520875 (online library-must submit e-mail-pretty cool)

http://www.rowan.edu/philosop/clowney/Aesthetics/philos_artists_onart/hegel.htm

Stephen Willats

http://www.ellipsis.com/catalogue/authors/Stephen_Willats.html

http://www.the-artists.org/ArtistView.cfm?id=D8A54B7B-477D-46F7-B16D8ABC74422142

Hans Herbert Kogler

http://www.mythosandlogos.com/Gadamer.html

Foucault

http://www.synaptic.bc.ca/ejournal/foucault.htm

http://www.michel-foucault.com/

More on Jay Koh

http://www.araiart.jp/myan2904.html

http://cologneweb.com/68elf/JayKoh/

The artist Jay Koh was born in Singapore and since 1999 has been a German citizen. He is currently base in South East Asia, managing an art and cultural centre (NICA Networking + Initiatives for Culture and the Arts) in Yangon and working to set up a new space in Kuala Lumpur. The concepts of his art practice are grounded in the Critical Theory of the Frankfurt School (Institute for Social Research) and the New French Theory of Foucault and Derrida with references to Intercultural studies.

Jay is also lecturer and writer. His works and writings are based on the concepts of Engaged Art and Critical Art Practice. Jay's efforts in building up a critical discourse, complemented by practice, on Engaged Art activities include his work as the organiser of the Collaboration, Networking and Resource Sharing - Myanmar, Yangon; International Symposium of Public Engaged Art, The Substation, Singapore and curator of the International Symposium and Project for City Transformers, Laznia Centre for Contemporary Art, Danzig, Poland.

His recent talks in 2005 was in Art and Social Intervention: the Incidental Person, Tate Britain; Setting up an Uncomfortable Site, PSi#11, Brown University, Providence and Art and Knowledge-Encounter in Intercultural art projects, Helsinki Art Museum and Academy of Fine Arts, Helsinki.

For 2006, he is commissioned to create an exhibition for PSi#12, Queen Mary University, London for Site of Rights and as a resource curator to create an international workshop programme for practicing young curators from 37 countries in Asia and Europe initiated by Asia-Europe Foundation (ASEF) in collaboration with Goethe Institute, Jakarta and Selasar Sunaryo Art Space, Bandung.

Gemma Corradi Fiumara

http://www.dialogueworks.co.uk/dw/wr/juggle.html

(cool website related to children, dialogue, e-mail and philosophy)

Mary Field Belenky-Women’s Ways of Knowing Project

http://www.webster.edu/~woolflm/wwok.html

Mikhail Bakhtin

http://www.colorado.edu/English/ENGL2012Klages/bakhtin.html

http://www.rpi.edu/~zappenj/Bibliographies/bakhtin.htm

Emmanuel Levinas

http://mythosandlogos.com/Levinas.html

http://faculty.evansville.edu/tb2/trip/prophet.htm

Luce Irigaray

http://mythosandlogos.com/Irigaray.html

http://www.envf.port.ac.uk/illustration/images/vlsh/psycholo/irigaray.htm

*Also begin to research paper about topic of choice for series

create a fact sheet for class members about topic

For March 7

Bring in the conceptual plan for your art piece

-What are you going to do?

-How are you going to do it? (Timeline)
-What impact do you hope it makes?

See the Interventionists for inspiration

March 7-discuss conceptual plans

March 14-SPRING BREAK

March 21-Discuss readings from Feb 31

Discuss Lesson plan

Research one of these artists for a five minute presentation

Mark Dion

Gran Fury

Simon Grenan and Christopher Sperandio

Group Material

Ha Ha

Jenny Holzer

Daniel Martinez

Tim Rollins and KOS (Mike Ayers)

David Avalos

Louis Hock

Liz Sisco

Keith Haring

Read Lacy’s introduction to Mapping the Terrain: New Genre Public Art

Read interview with Mary Jane Jacob

http://www.communityarts.net/readingroom/archivefiles/1999/12/concentric_circ.php

Read Chapter 4

References

Ben Morea

http://info.interactivist.net/article.pl?sid=05/05/06/1354249&mode=nested&tid=22

Henry Flynt

http://www.artnotart.com/fluxus/hflynt--.html

http://www.henryflynt.org/

Woman’s Building in LA

http://www.womansbuilding.org/

(CETA), U.S. government program designed to assist economically disadvantaged, unemployed, or underemployed persons. Enacted in 1973, CETA provided block grants to state and local governments to support public and private job training and such youth programs as the Job Corps and Summer Youth Employment. In 1982, CETA was superseded by the Job Training Partnership Act, which established the Office of Job Training Programs.

John Malpede-(SO COOL!)

http://lapovertydept.org/

Art In America Article about Soul Shadows

http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1248/is_n6_v81/ai_13920450

Pierre Bourdieu (might help, might not)

http://www.analitica.com/bitblioteca/bourdieu/neoliberalism.asp

Alfredo Jaar

http://www.alfredojaar.net/