Man Ray

Artist:  Emmanuel Radnitzky (Man Ray)

Birth-Death:  8/27/1890 – 11/18/1976

Movement:  Surrealism, Dadaism

Bio:  Born in South Philadelphia, Pennsylvania in 1890, Emmanuel Radnitzky was the eldest son of Russian-Jewish immigrants.  In reaction to the anti-Semitism and ethnic discrimination in 1912, the Radnitzky family changed their last name to Ray.  Man Ray's father was a garment factory worker, and he also ran a small tailoring business out of his home.  Man Ray and his siblings worked for his father's business at a young age, which inspired much of his art later on (working with garments, patchwork, and tailoring materials).  After his graduation from high school, he decided to become an artist, declining a scholarship to study architecture.  Around 1916, Man Ray began involving himself with the Dada movement.  Dada was considered an "anti-art" movement, rejecting the prevailing standards of art and implementing anti-war politics.  In 1921, he moved to Paris, where he resided for nearly 20 years.  Back and forth between Paris and America, he spent about half of his life in each place (roughly forty years each).

            Similarly to the other artists profiled in this blog, Man Ray was raised in working class conditions – literally "rags" to "riches."  Like Mark Rothko, he was from a Russian-Jewish family of immigrants whom changed their names (Rothko was originally "Rothkowitz").  Man Ray actively challenged the "civilization" of art and its supposed sophistication by participating in the Dada movement.  Also like Rothko, he seemed to have been aware of his status in the art society.  He also rejected the concept of a status.

            The first video above talks about Man Ray's fascination and utilization of African art, and how it became fashionable because of his photographs.  The tone of the woman in the video, as well as the narrator, is much more formal than that of the second video.  Though the second video focuses more on African art than Man Ray, the woman is an artist who understands her society.  She mentions appropriation of art, and continues to note that curators, art historians, and writers are really the only ones concerned with it – not artists.  Artists are more concerned with their expression and work.  How does this idea of curators/historians/writers/etc. talking more about money than artists do tie into the concept of uncivilized people becoming famous in a civilized world?

Rothko

Artist:  Mark Rothko

Birth-Death:  9/25/1903 – 2/25/1970

Movement:  Abstract Expressionism, Color Field painting

Bio:  Mark Rothko was born in Dvinsk, Vitebsk Provence, Russian Empire in 1903.  Because Rothko was Jewish, and Jews had been widely blamed for many of Russia's problems at the time, he lived most of his childhood in fear of being harmed.  In 1913, he immigrated to America with his mother and sister to meet his father and brothers, whom had already left to avoid being drafted into the Czarist army.  Rothko's father died a few months later, however, leaving the family with no income.  He soon started working at the age of ten, and then started school the same year as a third grader.  He learned four languages by the time he started school – Russian, Yiddish, Hebrew, and English.  He later attended Yale on a scholarship, but he found it to be too racist and elitist, so he quickly dropped out.  In 1923, Rothko visited a friend at the Art Students League of New York, where he witnessed several students sketching a model.  In short, he was inspired by this event to enter the art world.

            Rothko's upbringing was practically the antithesis of the distinguished upper class involved in the art world.  He was from a working class family, living in Russia.  Not only that, but he was a Russian Jew, which was even less respected in his country of origin.  He even had to work while he was a child in school.  Although he attended Yale, Rothko dropped out because he knew he did not belong to such a pompous circle of scholars.  He was not brought up to be "civilized," but when the opportunity to become so was presented to him, he rejected it and wished to remain himself – unchanged by the elitism he faced.

            Regarding Rothko's rejection of Yale and the Four Seasons restaurant offer in the video above, as well as his famous quote reenacted in the second video, it is apparent that he was aware of his profession's cold and business-oriented mentality.  Does this awareness reinforce the idea that he painted purely for his own expression?  How do his paintings serve as refusals to adhere to societal guidelines?

 

Pollock

Artist:  Jackson Pollock

Birth-Death:  1/28/1912 - 8/11/1956

Movement:  Abstract Expressionism

Bio:  Born in Cody, Wyoming, 1912, Pollock was the son of Leroy Pollock and Stella May McClure.  His father was a farmer, and then later a land surveyor for the government.  In 1928, Jackson Pollock was expelled from his high school.  He then attended Los Angeles' Manual Arts High School, from which he was also expelled.  In 1930, he and his brother moved to New York City where they studied at the Art Students League of New York.  Pollock worked for the WPA Federal Art Project from 1935-1943.  From 1938-1942 he underwent psychotherapy with different doctors in an attempt to fight his alcoholism.  Eventually, in 1956, he died in an alcohol-induced car accident.

            Just as Basquiat and Warhol, Pollock was born into a working class family.  Both he and his father worked for the government.  Also similar to Basquiat and Warhol, he had trouble in school.  Instead of dropping out or being an outcast, however, he was expelled twice.  These events may give some insight into the aggression often associated with his work.  His method of drip painting and abstract expressionism, while not the very first of its kind, was a challenge to the art world.  Some argue that there is meaning behind every painting, while others argue that Pollock had no intention of giving his work meaning, that it was purely aesthetic – like a cloud in the sky.  When comparing his paintings to a realistic Italian Renaissance painting, it is interesting to note that they are both considered some of the highest forms of art, despite their extreme differences and qualities. 

          After watching the three videos above, from Jackson Pollock talking about himself, to an artistic documentary about him, to a local news special profiling him, how do the tones change with each video?  Who is the target audience of each video, and how is this apparent in each?

Warhol

Artist:  Andy Warhol

Birth-Death:  8/6/1928 – 2/22/1987

Movement:  Pop Art

Bio:  Andy Warhol was born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania in 1928.  His parents were both working class emigrants from Miko (now called Mikova), and his father worked in a coal mine.  In third grade, Warhol had chorea, a disease that causes involuntary movements of the extremities.  Following this, he became a hypochondriac, developing a fear of hospitals and doctors.  Throughout his school years, he was often bed-ridden, which led to his being considered an outcast.  When he was thirteen, his father tragically died in an accident.  In 1949, he moved to New York and began his career in magazine and advertisement art, which quickly led to his fame in the pop art movement.

What is interesting about Andy Warhol is that, after crossing the line between working class and high class, he began to dominate the latter throughout the better part of the 1960s.  The Factory was a rejection of expressionism – a place of mechanical creativity: of setting standards for the masses by way of mass production.  How is it possible, though, that someone who was not born into sophistication can suddenly deem what is and is not "high art?"  If the art world is the epitome of "civilized" living, but an "uncivilized" person can break into and subjugate it, does "civilization" even exist?  That is, the idea of an elite group. 

I think it's funny (and ironic) that Andy Warhol's work merged the real and fake by portraying actual objects and people in repeated – fake – ways…and now there is a group of people deciding which Warhols are real and fake.  I can hear Andy now, "Oh, gosh…how marvelous…"

Basquiat

Artist:  Jean-Michel Basquiat

Birth-Death:  2/22/1960 – 8/12/1988

Movement:  Neo-expressionism

Bio:  Jean-Michel Basquiat was born in Brooklyn, New York in 1960 to Gerard Basquiat, a Haitian, and Matilde Andrades, a Puerto Rican.  Basquiat learned how to read and write by the age of four, and was encouraged by his mother to express himself artistically.  By the age of eleven, he could fluently speak, read, and write English, French, and Spanish.  At the age of seven, Basquiat was hit by a car and underwent a month-long recovery in the hospital, where his mother brought him a copy of "Grey's Anatomy," which later influenced his art.  That same year, his parents separated and his father raised him.  At fifteen, Basquiat began running away from home and sleeping on park benches.  Basquiat dropped out of high school in the tenth grade, and then his father kicked him out of the house.  He spent much time living in friends' houses and supporting himself by selling T-shirts and postcards.  Soon after, his professional art career began.

     Obviously, Basquiat was not raised a sophisticated aristocrat.  In fact, even after his art became well known and he was successful, he was still not an aristocrat.  This did not mean he wasn't intelligent, educated, or extremely talented – only that he was not part of the elite art world.  Basquiat came from a broken home, and had an arguably troubled youth.  He often modeled much of his work on graffiti-style painting, and even painted graffiti as SAMO.  In many ways, his art was the opposite of "class" and "etiquette" because it culminated so many other forms of art that had been born on the street, like graffiti.  But, he also seemed to blend the "uncivilized" with the "civilized," such as his re-creations and interpretations of classic works by Da Vinci and other artists.  His work is representative of the blurred line between the two statuses that he transcends.  Interestingly, he transcends these statuses because of his capacity to blur the line, which obscures it once again.



What are the differences between the way the narrator talks about Jean-Michel Basquiat and the way he talks about himself?  How do these differences reflect the supposed status of each man?

Purpose

The purpose of this blog is to examine the role of the "uncivilized" person in "civilized" society.  For this reason, I have chosen to take a close look at several artists who may fit this status. 

The art world is considered to be one of the most "civilized" realms of interest; those who are well versed in the topic and collect fine art seem to be praised for their knowledge and sophistication.  Moreover, to a common person – a philistine, as some art collectors may refer to them – this big, cultural, artistic engine seems to be what separates the "civilized" from the "uncivilized."  It is constantly pumping and churning and repeating tiny combustions of brilliance to determine what the civilized person thinks about; how he should be thinking; why he should think about such things.  Following this logic, common people have no say in what is acceptable and civilized.  They merely adhere to societal guidelines determined by a more elite group. 

In this cultural structure, artists are the ones who provide the ideas and concepts about which to be thought.  Does this mean that artists are part of the elite group at the top of the civilization chain, turning the heads of those down below?  In fact, they are not.  They are nails in the floor, sticking out with the rest of us.  The difference is that they do not care if they are pounded down; they are not part of the civilized system of culture.  Because of their apathy, and in many cases rebellion, toward the systematic ideas trickled down to us, they are not pounded down, but instead lifted out of the floor completely – transcending the other nails.

To label artists "uncivilized" would be to discredit them entirely; great artists typically avoid labeling themselves as anything other than themselves.  I do not wish to label anyone.  Instead, I am posing the questions, "Were they uncivilized?" and, "What would make a 'civilized' person think of them as 'uncivilized,' if not for their art?"  My goal is not to prove the irony of a "lesser" person's ideas becoming culturally sophisticated, or to renounce the absolute brilliance of artistic icons.  My goal is to open the readers' eyes and allow them to see just how equal they are to those at the top.  After all, there cannot be a proverbial top without a bottom.