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Seminar Current Issues in Art Education: Identity, Social Justice, Activism
Associate Professor Rachel Williams
University of Iowa
Spring 2006

Texts

The Interventionists: Users' Manual for the Creative Disruption of Everyday Life By: Nato Thompson (Editor), Gregory Sholette (Editor)

Conversation Pieces: Community and Communication in Modern Art
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 Community Arts Network 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 WochenKlausur
Interview with Jeannee
http://www.variant.randomstate.org/ 16texts/Concrete_Interventions.html

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/

Hope Sandrow
http://www.nature.org/aboutus/ inresponse/about/art4893.html
http://www.nature.org/aboutus/ inresponse/about/sandrow.html

Wendy Ewald
http://globetrotter.berkeley.edu/Ewald/

March 28 – Watch Born into a Brothel

Read: http://auto_sol.tao.ca/node/view/ 1474?menus_expanded[184]= 1&PHPSESSID=c3c6e2a8ee413fb33a9859ad2b663a60

Be prepared to discuss

Turn in your lesson plan related to your topic and artist

(BRING COPIES FOR EVERYONE IN CLASS)

April 4-Discuss Born into a Brothel

Read Chapter 5

And about the Environmental Justice Project in New Orleans
http://www.communityarts.net/readingroom /archivefiles/2002/09/drawing_the_lin.php

References:

Gilles Deleuze
http://www.egs.edu/resources/deleuze.html
http://mythosandlogos.com/Deleuze.html

Jean-Luc Nancy
http://www.iep.utm.edu/n/Nancy.htm

Georges Batille
http://www.kirjasto.sci.fi/bataille.htm

Miwon Kwon
http://www.recirca.com/backissues/c102/revmk.shtml
http://www.eipcp.net/diskurs/d07/text/kwon_prepublic_en.html

Kate Ericson and Mel Ziegler
http://mitpress.mit.edu/catalog/item /default.asp?ttype=2&tid=10785
http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles /mi_m0268/is_n9_v32/ai_15484745

Fred Wilson
http://www.bampfa.berkeley.edu/exhibits/fred_wilson/

Renee Green
http://www.the-artists.org/ArtistView.cfm?id= 8A01F516-BBCF-11D4-A93500D0B7069B40

Andrea Fraser
http://www.the-artists.org/ArtistView.cfm?id= DC392821-C495-4096-8CBA0AEE5EE29618

Critical Art Ensemble
http://www.critical-art.net/

115-118 in The Interventionists
http://www.eyemagazine.com/print/review.php?id=119&rid=541

Iris Marion Young
http://www.oup.com/us/catalog/general/subject /Politics/PoliticalTheory/PoliticalPhilosophy /?ci=0198297556&view=usa

Cristen Crujido – Not much to be found
http://www.oturn.net/sketch/community-art.html

Mama Toro
http://www.bbc.co.uk/videonation /articles/m/manchester_mamaknowsbest.shtml

Artbarns
http://www.permanence.de/millscat /installations/artbarn/artbarns.htm

The Bogside artists
http://www.bogsideartists.com/

Carole Conde and Karl Beveridge
http://www.cepagallery.com/cepa/exhibits /EXHIBIT.19992000/Unlimited2/carolencarlstatement.html

Fred Lonidier
http://www.corpwatch.org/article.php?id=697

April 11 – Discuss Chapter 5

April 18 – Share Artwork or documentation of art project

April 25 – Share Artwork-Talk about final paper

May 2 – Last Class-potluck share thoughts in final paper and turn it in

May 9 – Meet individually to talk over class and final papers/grade