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Was modern art a CIA psy-op? (2020)

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Re: Was modern art a CIA psy-op? (2020)

#191

Post by [deleted] »

simpaticoder wrote: post #23
sublinear wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Eventually, people realize they will never agree and therefore don't have to fight. They realize the majority of their beliefs already existed before they were born and will continue on after they're dead. They have nothing to add to the conversation while they are too busy fighting. They turn their focus to developing their ideas peacefully and let their subcultures flourish once again. This isn't the first cycle an…

"Live and let live" is in fundamental tension with "protect the weak." ALL aggressive ideologies act as heroes protecting others from oppression. There is a barely expressible thing that allows people to live in peace with those they disagree with. It is a personality trait, an aesthetic, a mood associated with the best of the Enlightenment but never described by it. Perhaps people need relative silence, a few good b…

[deleted]

Re: Was modern art a CIA psy-op? (2020)

#193

Post by afpx »

inigyou wrote: post #172
afpx wrote: post #148

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wait til you find out what the GIA[1] did with other forms of cultural expression and education - like motion pictures, music, television, and academia [1]: Global Intelligence Agency - because we know that they have deep reach into every nation at this point and are only accountable to themselves.

Are you referring to the way they always have to portray the American army as the heroic winners of every war?

Yes!

Re: Was modern art a CIA psy-op? (2020)

#194

Post by bluegatty »

ivan_gammel wrote: post #85

Not the first time when the Default Country thinks they invented everything. The title is almost comical. Modern art, as everyone should know, started in 1860s in Europe inspired by technological advances, globalization of trade and cultural exchange. Japanese art made huge blast, photography pushed to seek new forms of expression, social progress demanded new messages and new images. We had impressionism, post-impre…

And Xerox invented the GUI but who cares?

'Mid 20th century' is when the explosion of mass media happened, and these concepts were globalized.

It's worth studying for sure, and frankly, it seems the CIA came to a reasonable conclusion. The backed art for literally the right reasons. Good on them.

Re: Was modern art a CIA psy-op? (2020)

#195

Post by ivan_gammel »

boredumb wrote: post #186
ivan_gammel wrote: post #85

Not the first time when the Default Country thinks they invented everything. The title is almost comical. Modern art, as everyone should know, started in 1860s in Europe inspired by technological advances, globalization of trade and cultural exchange. Japanese art made huge blast, photography pushed to seek new forms of expression, social progress demanded new messages and new images. We had impressionism, post-impre…

Let's hear what non-default country invented pop-art in the 50s.

The one with the young Queen, which also invented English language…

Re: Was modern art a CIA psy-op? (2020)

#196

Post by jackb4040 »

tancop wrote: post #187

The art itself is not a psyop and it can't be because it's too abstract to send a political message. The movement around it was supported in a CIA psyop to present America as the place where artists are free to do what they want, at a time when the Soviet Union enforced socialist realism as the only official art style and if you did something different you couldn't get state funding. It was a good old PR move. A lot…

> if you did something different you couldn't get state funding

RTFA. This is literally what the CIA did, to soft-blacklist marxists and prevent them from becoming successful artists

Re: Was modern art a CIA psy-op? (2020)

#197

Post by rdtsc »

ivan_gammel wrote: post #85

Not the first time when the Default Country thinks they invented everything. The title is almost comical. Modern art, as everyone should know, started in 1860s in Europe inspired by technological advances, globalization of trade and cultural exchange. Japanese art made huge blast, photography pushed to seek new forms of expression, social progress demanded new messages and new images. We had impressionism, post-impre…

I think you might be reacting to the title only. The claim in the article is better phrased as “the Modern art was psy-op-ed by the US govt, especially through CIA”. They didn’t invent it, they may not even liked it personally. The very same artists making these paintings were not too far from being left leaning and sympathizing with regimes and ideas US government fought against. Nevertheless, it was still worth it, the sponsorship was seen as a counter to the Soviet art and culture. If anything a least as a “look you can even create these crazy paint splatters in a free society and nobody sends you to gulag” kind of angle.

Re: Was modern art a CIA psy-op? (2020)

#198

Post by gizajob »

nemo wrote: post #169
gizajob wrote: post #73

The CIA didn’t invent the camera which was really the trigger for the arrival of modern art and the abandonment of representation everywhere in the world. At the same time though, if you go somewhere like the Guggenheim in Bilbao, upon leaving that fantastic building it does occur to you that the whole thing is an outpost for American artistic culture, or if you want to frame it another way, American cultural imperia…

"the abandonment of representation everywhere in the world" Worth checking out Socialist Realism, both the thing that motivated the CIA to fund and promote non-representative art and help develop it into a fad, and also a large corpus of representative art that existed when you imagine it did not (there's many others besides, non-representative art has always been a small niche relative to all art produced which is p…

I didn’t say complete abandonment. You’re imagining what I’m imagining.

Re: Was modern art a CIA psy-op? (2020)

#199

Post by Garlef »

OroPla wrote: post #158
Garlef wrote: post #140

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The word has not only one but several clear meanings: > In the context of art history, modernity (Fr. modernité) has a more limited sense, modern art covering the period of c. 1860–1970. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Modernity

If it was clear we wouldn't be having this conversation.

I know.

But I was trying to reach the person who left the parent comment.

And hitting them with a phrasing that is directly poststructuralist seemed to be the wrong approach since they appear to operate in a structuralist framing.

Re: Was modern art a CIA psy-op? (2020)

#200

Post by trgn »

polnoner wrote: post #149
MachineMan wrote: post #130

Old news. Modern art is Antiart made to destroy European culture and replace it for the global debauchery of Americana. Harmful to the soul, void of talent, turning western civilization from master painters to banana + duct tape. EDIT: Saachi works similar to the way boy and girl bands are created. They are not artists, but underpaid unknowns whose works are packaged, productized, propped up, marketed and sold like K…

This is nonsense. Modern art is modern art because by the early 20th century, it was hard to do anything original in something resembling a traditional style. It is the same reason for serial/12 tone music. Arnold Schoenberg wasn't a psyop. If anything it is a comment on the lack of modern cultural sophistication and the way people relate to the world in terms of sensationalist narrative for click optimization.

you're agreeing, just harping on slight different (and all valid) uses of the words.
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