ART WARS August 15, 2003:

Fahne Hoch

A mini-exhibit in memory of   
Kirk Varnedoe, Museum of Modern Art curator,
who died on Thursday, August 14, 2003.

The following journal entries were written
before I heard of Varnedoe's death.

Friday, August 15, 2003  3:30 PM

ART WARS:

The Boys from Brazil

It turns out that the elementary half-square designs used in Diamond Theory

Sigaud's website The ANACOM Project  has a page that leads to the artist Athos Bulcão, famous for his work in Brasilia.

From the document

Conceptual Art in an
Authoritarian Political Context:
Brasilia, Brazil,

by Angélica Madeira:

"Athos created unique visual plans, tiles of high poetic significance, icons inseparable from the city."

As Sigaud notes, two-color diagonally-divided squares play a large part in the art of Bulcão.

The title of Madeira's article, and the remarks of Anna Chave on the relationship of conceptual/minimalist art to fascist rhetoric (see my May 9, 2003, entries* ), suggest possible illustrations for a more politicized version of Diamond Theory:

Fahne, S. H. Cullinane, Aug. 15, 2003

Dr. Mengele, according to Hollywood

Is it safe?

These illustrations were suggested in part by the fact that today is the anniversary of the death of Macbeth, King of Scotland, and in part by the following illustrations from my journal entries of July 13, 2003 comparing a MOMA curator to Lady Macbeth: 

Die Fahne Hoch, Frank Stella, 1959

Dorothy Miller, MOMA curator, died at 99 on July 11, 2003.

* May 9 entries are reproduced below.

Friday, May 9, 2003 ART WARS: The Religion of Cubism In the dome of the Capitol at Washington, DC, a painting depicts The Apotheosis of Washington.  Personally, I prefer the following pair of pictures, which might be titled Apotheosis of the Cube. logo Die A New York Times article says Tony Smith's instructions for fabricating Die were as follows: "a six-foot cube of quarter-inch hot-rolled steel with diagonal internal bracing." The transparent cube in the upper picture above shows the internal diagonals.  The fact that there are four of these may be used to demonstrate the isomorphism of the group of rotations of the cube with the group of permutations on an arbitrary set of four elements.  For deeper results, see Diamond Theory. For an explanation of why our current president might feel that the cube deserves an apotheosis, see the previous entry, "The Rhetoric of Power." See, too, Nabokov's Transparent Things: "Its ultimate vision was the incandescence of a book or a box grown completely transparent and hollow.  This is, I believe, it: not the crude anguish of physical death but the incomparable pangs of the mysterious mental maneuver needed to pass from one state of being to another.  Easy, you know, does it, son." 7:20 pm Friday, May 9, 2003 ART WARS The Rhetoric of Power: A meditation for Mental Health Month From "Secondary Structures," by Tom Moody, Sculpture Magazine, June 2000: "By the early ’90s, the perception of Minimalism as a 'pure' art untouched by history lay in tatters. The coup de grâce against the movement came not from an artwork, however, but from a text. Shortly after the removal of Richard Serra’s Tilted Arc from New York City’s Federal Plaza, Harvard art historian Anna Chave published 'Minimalism and the Rhetoric of Power' (Arts Magazine, January 1990), a rousing attack on the boys’ club that stops just short of a full-blown ad hominem rant. Analyzing artworks (Walter de Maria’s aluminum swastika, Morris’s 'carceral images,' Flavin’s phallic 'hot rods'), critical vocabulary (Morris’s use of 'intimacy' as a negative, Judd’s incantatory use of the word 'powerful'), even titles (Frank Stella’s National Socialist-tinged Arbeit Macht Frei and Reichstag), Chave highlights the disturbing undercurrents of hypermasculinity and social control beneath Minimalism’s bland exterior.  Seeing it through the eyes of the ordinary viewer, she concludes that 'what [most] disturbs [the public at large] about Minimalist art may be what disturbs them about their own lives and times, as the face it projects is society’s blankest, steeliest face; the impersonal face of technology, industry and commerce; the unyielding face of the father: a face that is usually far more attractively masked.' ” From Maureen Dowd's New York Times column of June 9, 2002:  "The shape of the government is not as important as the policy of the government. If he makes the policy aggressive and pre-emptive, the president can conduct the war on terror from the National Gallery of Art." From the New York Times,  Friday, May 2, 2003: The National Gallery of Art in Washington has just acquired Tony Smith's first steel sculpture: "Die," created in 1962 and fabricated in 1968. "It's a seminal icon of postwar American art," said Earl A. Powell III, director of the National Gallery. Die (Tony Smith) Bishop Moore From a New York Times obituary, Friday, May 2, 2003: Bishop Dies by Ari L. Goldman Paul Moore Jr., the retired Episcopal bishop of New York who for more than a decade was the most formidable liberal Christian voice in the city, died yesterday at home in Greenwich Village. He was 83.... Bishop Moore argued for his agenda in the most Christian of terms, refusing to cede Biblical language to the Christian right. Although he retired as bishop in 1989, he continued to speak out, taking to the pulpit of his former church as recently as March 24, even as illness overtook him, to protest the war in Iraq. "It appears we have two types of religion here," the bishop said, aiming his sharpest barbs at President Bush. "One is a solitary Texas politician who says, `I talk to Jesus, and I am right.' The other involves millions of people of all faiths who disagree." He added: "I think it is terrifying. I believe it will lead to a terrible crack in the whole culture as we have come to know it.".... [In reference to another question] Bishop Moore later acknowledged that his rhetoric was strong, but added, "In this city you have to speak strongly to be heard." Paul Moore's early life does not immediately suggest an affinity for the kinds of social issues that he would later champion.... His grandfather was one of the founders of Bankers Trust. His father was a good friend of Senator Prescott Bush, whose son, George H. W. Bush, and grandson, George W. Bush, would become United States presidents. Related material (update of May 12, 2003): Pilate, Truth, and Friday the Thirteenth The Diamond Theory of Truth Understanding: On Death and Truth Question: Which of the two theories of truth in reading (2) above is exemplified by Moore's March 24 remarks? 6:30 pm

Thursday, August 14, 2003  3:45 AM

Famous Last Words

The ending of an Aug. 14 Salon.com article on Mel Gibson's new film, "The Passion":

" 'The Passion' will most likely offer up the familiar puerile, stereotypical view of the evil Jew calling for Jesus' blood and the clueless Pilate begging him to reconsider. It is a view guaranteed to stir anew the passions of the rabid Christian, and one that will send the Jews scurrying back to the dark corners of history."

-- Christopher Orlet

"Scurrying"?!  The ghost of Joseph Goebbels, who famously portrayed Jews as sewer rats doing just that, must be laughing -- perhaps along with the ghost of Lady Diana Mosley (née Mitford), who died Monday.

This goes well with a story that Orlet tells at his website:

"... to me, the most genuine last words are those that arise naturally from the moment, such as

Joseph Goebbels

Voltaire's response to a request that he foreswear Satan: 'This is no time to make new enemies.' "

For a view of Satan as an old, familiar, acquaintance, see the link to Prince Ombra in my entry last October 29 for Goebbels's birthday.

Wednesday, August 13, 2003  3:00 PM

Best Picture

For some reflections inspired in part by

• Today's anniversary of a
  1727 Moravian Pentecost,
• An April 7, 2003,
  lecture at Moravian College, and
• St. Bonaventure's 1259
  remarks on the Trinity,

click here.