Was modern art a CIA psy-op? (2020) • Hacker News Board

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

#201

Post by rafram » Tue, Aug 25, 2026, 1:34 PM UTC

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…

You clearly didn't even click through to the article, and neither did most of the people arguing with you.

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

#202

Post by tpurves » Tue, Aug 25, 2026, 1:38 PM UTC

Literally the best possible kind of psy-op. Same with translating Sesame Street and distributing it to 100s of countries. Same with countries like Thailand exporting Thai food. It's a psy op based on what if we took nice things from our country and subsidized distributing them to the rest of the world, our country would grow in prestige and soft power. And these strategies are usually pretty effective, not to mention usually net-positive for all sides ... compared with so many other horibble harms US and other countries foreign offices have done around the world out of self interest.

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

#203

Post by blini-kot » Tue, Aug 25, 2026, 1:40 PM UTC

yes

yes, it was

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

#204

Post by [deleted] » Tue, Aug 25, 2026, 1:42 PM UTC

FLeXMurphy wrote: post #189

coldtea wrote: post #115

A lot of people are confused by the term "modern art" in this. This isn't meant to be about the idea of modern art in general, not about modernist art, or a "history of art" compatible conception of the term. So whether "modern art started with the invention of the film camera" and other such claims about the late 19th here is irrelevant. In the context of TFA and the CIA-related discussion, "modern art" refers mainl…

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[deleted]

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

#205

Post by coldtea » Tue, Aug 25, 2026, 1:44 PM UTC

FLeXMurphy wrote: post #189

coldtea wrote: post #115

A lot of people are confused by the term "modern art" in this. This isn't meant to be about the idea of modern art in general, not about modernist art, or a "history of art" compatible conception of the term. So whether "modern art started with the invention of the film camera" and other such claims about the late 19th here is irrelevant. In the context of TFA and the CIA-related discussion, "modern art" refers mainl…

[flagged]

It's precisely the kind of forum where answers adding context are appreciated. Might take more than a barely month-old account to see it though.

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

#206

Post by trgn » Tue, Aug 25, 2026, 1:47 PM UTC

WD-42 wrote: post #18

I don’t know if this is a reaction to AI or something, but recently I’ve only been interested in classical/realism art. I just can’t do abstract cubes anymore. The default wallpaper of windows 11 is a perfect example - I hate it. Give me a wallpaper of some painting from the Renaissance.

i wonder about this too.

modern art (the cubes etc) always had a cerebral, iconoclastic, anti-bourgeois element. and i think those are just markers and categories that have no meaning anymore in 2026. everybody's smart now, watching ted talks, with their college degrees. iconoclasm is just corporate branding now at best, and we've all witnessed its literal expression since 9/11 and blm, which is quite vile and steeped in mass hysteria. and the bourgeois, where are they, these decorous, self-confident and self-actualized burghers? i haven't seen them in a long time, what is there to rage against.

the substrate is gone for modern art. i'm not saying some of the aesthetics can't prevail, e.g. the minimalism, an interest in geometry, ...

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

#207

Post by paimapi » Tue, Aug 25, 2026, 1:49 PM UTC

yet another case of an editor writing a clickbait headline for a much more nuanced article about a very specific and interesting topic

it both makes sense and seems very obvious that the CIA utilized an artistic movement as both a tool of internal domestic propaganda (excluding Soviet art which was incredible for its time due to actually being publicly funded) and to push soft power overseas by dangling inclusion in supposedly prestigious cultural institutions (ie mostly playthings of the rich, populated with the owned art of the rich with the blessing of the government which increased the cultural prestige and thus later sale value of the art)

a more honest title might be 'Is the way we perceive modern art influenced by Cold War American propaganda'? but I suppose that wouldn't have Gen Z and Alpha clicking through and learning how culturally bankrupt things are in the West, and how pervasive and invisibilized so much of our domestic propaganda is

another example of this might be the way nonviolence as a protest strategy just happened to be greatly encouraged by the rich and CIA-connected [0] [1]

[0] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dmL7Ph4Us8o&lc

[1] https://openlibrary.org/books/OL17563812M/How_nonviolence_pr...

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

#208

Post by coldtea » Tue, Aug 25, 2026, 1:50 PM UTC

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.

It is clear, and millions of people have been using it in the way the TFA uses it, just as historians of art has used other definitions.

What it is not is obvious to derive from first principles ("says modern, so much mean current") or stuck to a single definition ("but historians call any art after the middle ages Modern").

But it is still trivial to pick the context in either use, and trivial for someone to read at least 1 paragraph about the "CIA psy-op" claim, whether it's true or not, and figure what it means by modern art there (it doesn't mean Van Gogh or Monet). People just want to comment without bothering.

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

#209

Post by sublinear » Tue, Aug 25, 2026, 2:08 PM UTC

rcxdude wrote: post #97

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…

This is just another 'people should just agree with me' that operates on a meta-level.

I'm not saying "agree to disagree". The question of agreement implies the awareness of a conflict at all.

I'm saying that every time we have new media there are opportunists bugging everyone else that normally wouldn't care. Time and energy are precious. Humanity's default state is, and should be, ignorance and apathy.

If those last two words boil your blood, you gotta take a look at the mirror and reconsider why. You don't have to reply. You don't even have to remember anything I'm writing here. Just let go and be free. That doesn't have to mean you agreed/disagreed with me. You can in fact put the genie back in the bottle by completely abandoning it.

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

#210

Post by mikert89 » Tue, Aug 25, 2026, 2:10 PM UTC

notarobot123 wrote: post #93

mikert89 wrote: post #16

Far more things/movements are orchestrated than are organic. This is to me one of the most surprising things I have learned as I got older.

I assume by "orchestrated" you mean intended by the people involved in making them happen. Humans act in the world. Some people have power and influence that they bring to bear on their activities and desired outcomes. It's true. That said, there's a tendency (that I think increases as we age) to want to explain everything in terms of order, control and power. Explaining away the world's complexities seems to be a pr…

I meant orchestrated in a subversive way