Âť NORTHWESTERN/ART/REVIEW
dualities issue 5 fall 2010 northwesternartreview.org
dualities NORTHWESTERN/ART/REVIEW
»
KARI RAYNER publisher
karirayner2007@u.northwestern.edu
MARGARET WHITESIDES editor-in-chief margaretwhitesides2011@u.northwestern.edu
MEGAN LEE director of programming meganlee@u.northwestern.edu
MORGAN KREHBIEL director of communications
morgank@u.northwestern.edu
CAROL KIM director of finance carol.kim@u.northwestern.edu
EDITORIAL STAFF
ABIGAIL CURRY, Featured Artist Editor abigailcurry2007@u.northwestern.edu CAITLIN KEARNEY caitlinkearney2007@u.northwestern.edu ELEANOR FISHER eleanorfisher2012@u.northwestern.edu MADELINE AMOS, Featured Artist Editor madelineamos2013@u.northwestern.edu MORGAN KREHBIEL morgankrehbiel2012@u.northwestern.edu CAMILLE REYES camillereyes@aol.com MATTHEW KLUK matthewkluk2012@northwestern.edu JEFFREY DZIEDZIC jeffreydziedzic2007@u.northwestern.edu NAZIHAH ADIL n-adil@northwestern.edu
DESIGN
CHRISTOPHER ADAMSON christopher@polymathicmedia.com MARCY CAPRON, web marcy@polymathicmedia.com
art history department advisor NAR is a non-commercial journal published by students at Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois. Images are copyright their respective owners, and from ARTstor.org and used within their Terms and Conditions. Written material is © 2010, all rights reserved. Reproduction without permission is prohibited.
PROFESSOR CHRISTINA NORMORE art theory and practice department advisor
PROFESSOR LANE RELYEA
Âť NAR
is a student-produced journal based at Northwestern University dedicated to publishing undergraduate papers on art history and contemporary art trends. If you are interested in submitting a research paper or art review for publication in the journal, please contact our editor-in-chief at margaretwhitesides2011@u. northwestern.edu. If you are an undergraduate at any institute of higher education and interested in contributing in other ways, please contact the publisher at karirayner2007@u. northwestern.edu. NAR thanks its sponsors, staff, featured authors, and the Department of Art History at Northwestern University.
from the editor Dualities. Relationships. Dichotomies.
E
ach essay in the Fall 2010 edition of the Northwestern Art Review speaks to an intrinsic duality within their subject. From Magritte’s dual roles as artist and mass marketer, Jasper John’s exploration of consumption, commodity and value, the dialogue between old and new in the High Renaissance, and finally Gabriel Orozco’s understanding of object and ‘art object.’ Within the following essays, as a reader you will be asked to examine which of these dichotomies you take for granted, and which you find to be surprising. The critical eye of these undergraduate art historians has caught upon a series of inherent dualities, and each of these authors critiques the way in which certain artsists allow these dualities to define a specific component of their work.
support, without which this edition would not have been possible. Continual thanks go to Mary and Leigh Block Museum of Art at Northwestern University for its continual support. Finally, we would like to thank our graphic designer, Christopher Adamson and our webmaster Marcy Capron, without whom NAR would not be possible.
I would like to thank the Northwestern University Art History Department, especially the Director of Undergraduate Studies, Christina Kiaer. In addition, Northwestern Art Review would also like to thank Robert Linrothe and Christina Normore for their guidance as Undergraduate Advisers in the Art History Department. We would like to thank the Weinberg College of Arts and Sciences, and the Office of the Provost for their financial
Finally, I would like to thank the students who submitted work to Northwestern Art Review. I enjoyed engaging with each of them, and look forward to the submissions for the Winter 2010-11 issue.
I would like to express my thanks for Kari Rayner, our current publisher, as well as Caitlin Kearney, Eleanor Fisher, Madeline Amos, Morgan Krehbiel, Carol Kim, Megan Lee, Jeff Dziedzic, Nazihah Adil and Matthew Kluk, who form the core of the Northwestern Art Review family. Their dedication, drive and passion allow NAR to grow and expand within the national undergraduate Art History community.
Margaret Whitesides November 2010 Evanston, IL
table of contents 1of» jasper johns’ imprints the human figure: skin E M
by
drawing 8
ickevicius, page
milia
2» the “idiotic work” of renÉ K R , by
ari
ayner page
3typical »
magritte
20
not your readymade:
orozco’s B C , 34
by
rooke
onti page
games
4of»theandualexploration nature in the high renaissance:
renai E C ,
by
laine
how page
NOTES, page 60
|
46
ssance
page
8
page
20
page
34
page
46
Jasper Johns ’ imprints of the human figure »
Skin drawing by
emilia Mickevicius university of chicago
n “Language as Line: Six Artists Draw,” Rosalind Krauss writes of Jasper Johns’ Target: “[T]he drawing simply replicates the internal division of a commercially produced object; its exploitation of the design of a readymade, flat target deprives the painting of the specific kind of interiority that had infected postwar American art.” 1 Rather than an assault
I
»
study for skin I
— Jasper Johns 1962
on the ‘abstraction’ component of Abstract Expressionism, Johns’ Target is for Krauss “an act of demolition aimed at the ‘expressionist’ aspect of that title.”2 Indeed, the recurring motifs that can be found throughout Johns’ work lend themselves to this idea: primary colors, numbers, flags, the alphabet, the target, and even silverware are all objects that, as Richard Schiff articulates, “pre-exist in the form of representation”3 rather than acting as referents to Johns’ personal experience. However, Schiff also assigns Johns’ imprints of the human body to this category of anonymous subjects: hands, footprints, and in the case of Studies for Skin (1962), prints of the face. Are we then to disregard the fact that these imprints come from Johns’ own body? In order to navigate the question of how we are to understand Johns’ imprints—as marks of the artist? As universal signs?—I will focus on a few selected works, but particularly Studies for Skin 10
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(1962). By the nature of its execution and our knowledge of Johns’ own face as the physical element of construction, the imprints in Studies for Skin signify that he derives figuration from what could be understood as a mechanical process or action, and on a larger scale, asserts art as necessarily coming from the body. Before positioning Johns’ imprints of the figure in relation to his other typically preferred imagery, it is key to discuss Schiff’s understanding of Johns’ work as being exemplary of postmodern anamorphosis. For Schiff, the ubiquity, familiarity, and accessible nature of Johns’ subjects— numbers, letters, flags—lend them a marked “psychological equanimity.4 Meaning is conveyed through our associations to these conventional symbols; as Johns once said of his own intentions: “I’m interested in things that suggest the world rather than suggest the personality.”5 Likewise, on another occasion
he explained his attraction to such subjects and tools like stencils as stemming from how “they come that way.”6 Schiff calls what happens to Duchamp’s profile in According to What “a set of transformative distortions,”7 similar in concept to the traditional or “classical” understanding of artistic metamorphosis, but in postmodern anamorphosis, the movement on the part of the viewer in order to arrive at the correct vantage point is more metaphorical, and in the case of Johns in particular, his work “establishes no standard or nondeviant position” from which to do so.8 Furthermore, as Schiff observes, Johns “fails to express himself, to ‘mark’ the position of his person; by this evasion he distances himself from modernist practice,”9 which Krauss characterized elsewhere as embodying an “intense psychological privacy.”10 Johns is neither invested in an outpouring of himself, nor adhering to any aesthetic hierarchy. And this is what can be difficult in encountering Johns’ work: we want to know
jasper johns’ imprints of the human figure:
skin drawing
target with four faces
— Jasper Johns 1955
where things originate, because Johns has “render[ed] their histories obscure.”11 He asserts his non-ownership over images, evidenced by proclamations such as “It’s designed, not taken. It’s not mine.” Therefore, what become problematic are instances where the image undoubtedly originated in Johns—by virtue of his own body being the source of the mark. Schiff puts forth that unlike the other ordinary objects, body imprints or parts are “likely to evoke an emotional response.”12 12
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Objects like coat hangers or the digits zero through nine do not have many possibilities for variance in their forms, relative to the human figure. Such objects are already distilled to a type. Faces and bodies, on the other hand, are inherently different because just by their appearance, they connote identity or personality. The possibility of a ‘readymade’ face would only perhaps exist in the form of a manikin. Therefore, in keeping with the depersonalized or factual character of his other subjects,
Johns’ fragmentation of the human figure serves to prevent us from associating it with a personality. This is already evident in earlier works like Target with Four Faces, 1955. The faces, severed at the eyes, are situated on top of the target in compartmentalized boxes. By the removal of their gazes, they seem to lose any consciousness; they are distancing and defamiliarizing, almost suggestive of the uncanny. Here, then, figures take on the character of anonymity because they cannot look at us. The respective visual weights of the anonymous faces and target thus balanced.
jasper johns’ imprints of the human figure:
skin drawing
With that in mind, let us now turn to the way Johns employs images of the human figure in the form of imprints of his own body, and whether we can really assign them to the same category of anonymity. A handprint or footprint, like the digits zero through nine or the alphabet, is a widely recognized sign. However, does it not complicate the anonymity of the object when the identity of its source is just as well given? For now, let us examine his drawing series Study for Skin, 1962, and the subsequent lithograph Skin with O’Hara Poem, 1963-
65. In these works, Johns has used his own oil-covered face as the marking instrument, and in a performative gesture involving his entire body, printed its form multiple times by rolling his face across the page’s surface so as to make three distinct views (both the front and sides). Once he has taken charcoal and rubbed it over the areas covered in oil— the latent image—the actual images are made visible. This revelatory aspect of the charcoal is therefore photographic in character, because the oil and charcoal have acted in the same way as film and developer to reveal
what transpired across a moment. The final, visible image is not created simultaneously in contact with the object, as would happen by making a rubbing of a leaf, for example, but its shape is still pre-determined. The image originates in the thing itself. Having established the materiality of the process, let us now consider both the gesture and title in detail in order to determine whether we are to take Johns’ identity into account in coming to understand these faces. Firstly, the act of printing is decisive and happens quickly. Johns has a set intention of the
study for skin I-IV
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— Jasper Johns 1962
jasper johns’ imprints of the human figure:
skin drawing
direction and the action he will perform, and his precise movements govern how exactly the image will show up. The materials of oil and charcoal would traditionally allow for painterly manipulation, but Johns has used them here in a different way: his face is the primary mark-making instrument, and the other traditional materials serve to bring about its realization or tangibility. Their function is to show us the evidence of his action and movement. This documentary, recording-like use of the materials is also emphasized by the fact that both pieces are completed on drafting paper: in the lower right-hand corner of the image, there is a pre-printed space to fill out the dedication, title, and date, among other pieces of information. One can imagine that Johns would have been especially drawn to tracing paper or drafting paper for this reason—with its built-in corner that “[comes] that way.” Along the same lines,
the title Studies for Skin is not referential to Johns’ specific character. The word Studies communicates an ongoing process of discovery, or seeking knowledge through experimentation. Likewise, Skin is simply the tangible thing, a strict reference to the form or substance of skin as an anonymous material rather than being suggestive of any specific identity. The title is keeping in line with other directly referential titles like Target with Four Faces, which is exactly that: a target with four faces. Johns has used his own face like he would a stencil or an inanimate object. It is also evident that these works functions on multiple levels of perception. When we look at Studies for Skin and Skin with O’Hara Poem, we are not only faced with the two-dimensional end result of this process on paper, we also imagine the time in the past when Johns went up to this planar surface parallel to himself and completed the act
of making the image. The same does not go for all drawings or paintings; perhaps we tend to perceive works this way if they are especially evident of a process or action involving the artist’s entire body. The process is indeed documented in photographs, again emphasizing the performative nature of the work as being an integral part of how we perceive it. The temptation to fill in Johns’ presence for ourselves is somewhat due to the fact that the eyes do not show up. This moment in the piece is obviously caused by the printing process, but nevertheless not only harkens back to the severed gaze from Target with Four Faces, but also foreshadows his piece Skull (1973) in which he would take a skull and make a singular mark of it with the same process of oil and charcoal. Only the areas of his face and head where the flesh and bone structure is more pronounced show
— Jasper Johns 1963-65
skin with o’hara poem up, so that the eyes and ears are rendered vacant because of their concavity. Our tendency to imagine Johns in the process 16
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of creating this piece thus says something about its having to do with the universal construction of memory. Referring to Johns’
process of presenting the same image in different media, Schiff writes that he “refigure[s] his imagery as if continually retrieving it from interactive levels of
m
memory.”13 The face and hands appear to be in flux and not quite pinned down; since Johns had to rub the charcoal over the entire area in order to reveal the image, the charcoal marks in the areas outside the image become part of the image as well. They serve to embody the motion of rubbing, but also lend it a generally ghostly, ambivalent presence. Thus, Johns’ face in Studies for Skin and Skin with O’Hara Poem is a mark indisputably imbued with his identity by virtue of his direct contact with the page. However, he presents it as anonymous. It is a mark of the artist, but is more so to be understood as achieving figuration from the active, mechanical process of printing, in which the image takes place all at once. The subject originates in the tangible contact of its own referent or object. Finally, let us turn to a handful of contemporaneous works like Periscope (Hart Crane) from 1963, and Pinion (1966) to examine Johns’ use of handprints and footprints. The imprints here function only slightly dif-
jasper johns’ imprints of the human figure:
skin drawing
pinion
— Jasper Johns 1966
peris — Jasper Johns 1963
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jasper johns’ imprints of the human figure:
scope (hart crane) ferently. The hands and feet are hands and feet are no different even less obviously concerned than the colors of the spectrum, with an identity than the faces, numbers, or letters, even though but nevertheless present Johns every handprint bears fingerwith the same problem of how to prints, the most fundamental incorporate the human body— form of identity found within how to achieve figuration—and the structure of the body. In still avoid portraiture of a par- Periscope (Hart Crane), on the ticular identity. Unlike the three other hand, the figure functions views of the face that compose within the depicted machinery: Studies for Skin, the handprints the imprinted arm in Periscope and footprints in these works are is incorporated into the circular isolated, singular marks, so they scraping device, so that it seems elicit less of a kinetic response to be evidence of the hand’s role on the part of the viewer because in the formation of the mark. we are not so strongly prompted To conclude, the human figto imagine the process of their ure in the work of Jasper Johns creation. In Pinion, the imprints is fragmented so as to prevent are also accompanied by Johns’ them from being associated with stenciling of the words “HAND” any personality. However, conand “FOOT” and “KNEE,” add- cerning the imprints, our knowling to their literality and present- edge that they come from Johns’ ing them as he would the colors own body complicates the notion “RED” and “BLUE” in works that he has no ownership over where he names colors. The them, or that he uses them just
skin drawing
as he would employ the universal symbols of the flag or the alphabet. He does present the imprints as being anonymous, but the nature of the process that led to Study for Skin, for example, is something we cannot ignore as viewers. Johns once reflected that he “worked in a way such that I could say it’s not me… not confuse my feelings with what I produced.”14 What he has ultimately achieved in the works that bear his imprints is figuration without portraiture, and as a product of a mechanical process. He treats these hands, feet, and faces as inanimate objects, but in so doing, his art still originates in the body. » NAR
“idiotic work” the
of rene magritte
by
kari rayner
northwestern university
enè Magritte’s lecture “Lifeline,” which he gave in 1938 to an audience at the Koninklijk Museum in Antwerp, is perhaps one of the most self-analytical speeches the painter delivered during his career, providing great insight into his psyche. 1 Throughout, Magritte chronicles his development as a painter and his production of art, which began
R
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— RenÊ Magritte 1926
Publicity design for Norine: Couture Norine
in 1915 at the age of seventeen and which he continued until the end of his life. He particularly describes his discovery of Surrealism and the means by which his objectives as a painter evolved from undertaking to affix the essence of the world on canvas to the enterprise of examining reality itself. Not once in his lecture, however, did Renè Magritte mention an important aspect of his career: his commercial work. Though Magritte may have dis-
22
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missed it, this “low” art and the fine art he is most known for are inextricably linked, and it is precisely this connection that allowed him to become one of the most successful and visionary of the Surrealist painters. Renè Magritte was, first and foremost, a businessman. His early career consisted of commercial work in which he designed wallpapers, fabrics, illustrations, book covers, and advertisements.2 He continued
to take commissions for economic reasons for the rest of his life. Throughout his career, he made copies and reproductions of his paintings in order to disseminate his work and to meet the demands of his exhibition schedule.3 This was part of a commercialization of his work by his dealer, Alexander Iolas. Magritte also always had his public in mind: when critics rejected work from his “Vache” and “Renoir” periods, he returned to his ear-
the “idiotic work”
of renÉ magritte lier, successful style in order to safeguard his financial interests. Although he often relied on it for his welfare, however, Magritte openly disdained his advertising activity, referring to it as “idiotic work.”4 In fact, apart from this, Magritte “considered himself the greatest living painter of his time.”5 As much as he denied it, and would have liked to keep his commercial work separate from his paintings, his familiarity with advertising techniques and the aesthetics of his commercial work greatly influenced the production and appearance of his high art. There are very few surviving examples of commercial pieces such as hand-painted posters by Magritte with which to compare his fine art paintings.6 Nonetheless, those that have survived often contain icons or motifs that directly correspond with paintings made during the same time period that were intended as high art. One such reoccurring iconic
image is that of posts that resemble balustrudes, which Magritte referred to as “bilboquets.” These bilboquets often stood in for human figures in Magritte’s works. In 1924, Magritte began designing posters and ads for the couture house Norine, a business established during World War I. One such poster, created in 1926, features a female mannequin with a bilboquet in place of its head and anthropomorphically outstretched wooden arms. The paintings The Birth of the Idol, The Lost Jockey, and The Difficult Crossing, created in the same year, feature bilboquets shaped in exactly the same manner. The Lost Jockey is the first painting which Magritte himself described as “Surrealist” and “successful”; therefore, it is highly significant that he uses imagery from his advertisements in this painting. A later commercial work by Magritte, his design for the 1927 issue of Music edited by E.L.T. Mesens, combines ad-
ditional imagery from Magritte’s paintings of one year earlier: it includes a bilboquet with an eye very similar to that in The Difficult Crossing as well as images of sheet music, which are found in The Lost Jockey. Later examples of his commercial work also mirror his paintings. One of his most famous works of art, The Rape, painted in 1934, closely resembles a cigarette advertisement Magritte created in the same year.7 A blue sky backgrounds each work, the face is similarly centered and takes up the same amount of the image, and each head rests on an exaggeratedly long neck. The color and style of the hair in each is very similar as well, and both utilize flat areas of color and smooth surfaces. Magritte’s painting Black Magic, 1945, and a poster for the Festival Mondial du Film et des Beaux-Arts, created in 1947, also closely resemble each other.8 The woman’s face in the poster and
in the painting bear a likeness to one another. Both have a high forehead, long nose, and high cheekbones. The hairstyle of each woman is exactly the same, with curls on the top of her head and by her cheeks. Both women seem to be made of different substances than human flesh: the woman in Black Magic is tinged the same blue as the sky, and the woman in the Festival Mondial poster appears to be made of blue-tinted stone. Additionally, the motif of Magritte’s advertisement for Exciting perfumes by Mem from 1946 was reworked in the artist’s later paintings.9 The advertisement depicts a tree in which three doors in the trunk open to display perfume bottles, revealing the affinity between tree and cabinet. This image of a tree with three doors reappears in The Voice of Blood, painted in 1948. The painting and the advertisement both also play with scale: the perfume bottles in the advertisement are enlarged in order to fill the cavities of the 24
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tree trunk, while in his painting, Magritte miniaturizes a house to fit inside the tree trunk. These comparisons suggest that Magritte reused certain imagery in his commercial as well as fine art work throughout his artistic career, blurring the distinction between the two. The style of Magritte’s paintings also resembles that of commercial work and graphic artists in general. The smooth surfaces of his images conceal the means of production in a manner similar to that of posters and advertisements.10 His brush strokes are not visible, and he tends to employ color in a relatively flat manner. His use of certain images again and again such as the bilboquets compare to a shorthand of images often used for advertising. These techniques were used by graphic artists at the time and were rediscovered much later by Pop Art painters in New York, who deliberately incorporated mass-produced popular imagery into their work.11 In this way,
Magritte’s paintings can be said to resemble those of Andy Warhol and James Rosenquist, who have both stressed the importance the earlier artist had on the work. Magritte may have also incorporated postcard images into his paintings.12 For instance, his painting The Lovers, from 1928, resembles postcards of the period in which the detachment of the head from the body signifies fond memories of the lover. The placement of the lovers’ heads in relationship to each other in both are very similar. The pose of the woman in his painting Discovery, moreover, mirrors that of a popular postcard. It is highly unlikely that Magritte did not see these postcards since they resemble his paintings so closely. Thusly, not only did Magritte’s paintings inspire artists later who drew from pop culture and deliberately appropriated the techniques of graphic artists, but he was inspired by popular imagery in the form of massproduced postcards. Not only does the style of Magritte’s paintings resemble
René Magritte — both 1934
commercial work, but the psychology behind his choices of subject matter in his high art is also often used in advertising. Studies indicate that the Surreal ad, “induced the most effective information processing of the ad’s content in terms of recall, recognition, attitudes, affect toward the ad and behavioral intentions.”13 Surreal or “absurd” ads are more likely to be noticed because of their increased distinctiveness and are more memorable. Maximum impact on the viewer could be achieved in Surreal ads in a variety of ways including freeing an object of its expected role, introducing or withdrawing properties from an object, hybridizing two objects, or introducing a change of scale or substance.14 Magritte used many of these
the “idiotic work”
of renÉ magritte
the rape and cigarette ad
black magic and film festival poster — RenÊ Magritte 1945 and 1947
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the “idiotic work”
of renÉ magritte same techniques to make his artwork eye-catching and to cause the viewer to contemplate his work. In addition, in the 1920s, metaphors and the anthropomorphism of commodity objects began to be used in advertising.15 This paralleled the use of metaphor in Magritte’s paintings as well. In The Therapeutist, for example, the cage with the doves inside replaces the rib cage and is also a metaphor for the body imprisoning the soul.16 Whereas the advertising artist uses these Surreal techniques in order to reaffirm hierarchies of economic power and to create dreamlike and memorable images which fuel the consumer’s fantasies, Magritte had a very different goal in mind.17 He meant his images to provoke thought, cause an emotional shock, and challenge preconceived perceptions about reality, which he was able to achieve through these advertising techniques. Much of Magritte’s imagery
can further be said to resemble and have inspired pornography, an industry in which images are made for commercial gain and which can only debatably be called “art.” The aforementioned painting The Rape, was based on a drawing of the same title Magritte created in 1934 for Andrè Breton’s text Qu’est-ce que le Surrealisme?18 The commission of the work, in itself, raises the question of whether the image constitutes high or low art, but its relation to pornography confuses the issue further. In it, the woman’s access to speech has been deleted, and instead her sexual anatomy represents her. Magritte’s painting Eternal Evidence from 1930 literally fragments the female body into face, breasts, her genitals, knees, and feet, while his series of Woman Bottles stretch women to fit the shape of bottles and turns them into objects. Other paintings such as The Philosophy in the Boudoir from 1947 further refer-
ence the fetishizing of women as their sexual anatomy. The depiction of a hanging nightgown with human breasts melding into the fabric and shoes which end with human toes equates female anatomy and object. They are one and the same, altogether accessible, serviceable, and disposable. While much of Magritte’s work may have been made as a critique of the role of women, it is very much in line with other Surrealist work which directly relates to the Freudian theory of the male fear of castration and dissolution of the ego.19 The male fetishizes, deforms, or manipulates the female figure in order to overcome these fears. The Rape, in particular, may have been meant as a shock tactic in order to reveal hypocrisy in conventional bourgeois morality, but it doesn’t “disrupt the pornographic tradition of male voyeurism.”20 Whether or not Magritte’s imagery perpetuates or denounces female subjugation, the mutilation,
exciting perfumes by mem
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fetishization, and objectification of women in Magritte’s paintings is reflected in pornography over the last century. Specifically, “Snuff” films, which depict the death or murder of a person, and “split beaver shots,” which show closeups of female genitals and pubic hair, present the dismemberment of women, and magazines such as The Taskmaster and Leather Bound fetishize women as nothing but their sexual parts.21 These similarities call into question the relationship between Magritte’s paintings and the commercial images of the industry of pornography. That the imagery in Magritte’s paintings drew on advertising techniques makes it simple to appropriate it for further commercial use in cartoons, film, book jackets, and popular music. As the advertising industry has recognized and “has been quick to appreciate, Magritte’s art presents images that are instantly legible, often witty, sometimes shocking, usu— René Magritte 1946 and 1948
ally memorable.”22 Sabena airlines, which went bankrupt in 2001, was quick to jump at the chance to appropriate Magritte’s painting from 1966 Sky Bird for their logo: Magritte granted them permission to use it in exchange for the airline allowing the Magrittes’ dog to ride among the passengers rather than with the luggage.23 Afterwards, Sabena incorporated the image into their timetable and schedule of fares. Magritte’s painting from 1935, The False Mirror, was also appropriated in 1951 by William Golden for the CBS “eye” logo.24 Both images feature a blue sky and clouds behind the pupil of an eye. Although CBS denied the influence of Magritte’s painting, Magritte considered taking legal action against CBS, the resemblance was so strong. These examples, of which a plethora of others exist, illustrate the ease with which Magritte’s high art can be turned to commercial use due to the use of advertising techniques in their creation. The similarities between Renè Magritte’s commercial and
the “idiotic work”
of renÉ magritte
the voice of blood
fine art work and the blurring of these distinctions coheres with the ambitions of the avant-garde Surrealists and begs an examination of his relationship with the movement. Certainly Surrealism was, above all, revolutionary. It was inspired by Marxism, with the main goals of human liberation and social change. Magritte himself says that this is what first attracted him to the Surrealists, who “were then violently demonstrating their loathing for all the bourgeois values, social and ideological, that have kept the world in its present ignoble state.”25 His main aim was to provoke an emotional shock in the viewer, and to free people from their perceived restraints. Magritte says, “that pictorial experience which puts the real world on trial inspired in me belief in an infinity of possibles now unknown to life. I know I am not alone in affirming that their conquest is the only end and valid reason for the existence of man.”26 Paradoxically, throughout 30
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his career, Magritte attempted to distinguish himself from the movement in many ways. While younger artists wanted to revolutionize art, Magritte admitted in 1965, he wanted to break with it altogether.27 His “sunlit Surrealism” or “Renoir” period in the 1940s is an example of how he attempted to separate himself from orthodox Surrealism by integrating Impressionist techniques into his paintings.28 Magritte’s relationship with other Surrealists at the time was tenuous, perhaps influencing his intended break from the movement. He was originally part of a Belgian Surrealist group which had ties with the Paris Surrealists. As a result of an incident between Magritte and Breton in 1929, however, Magritte was entirely excluded from any Surrealist activity in France for three years and from Breton’s manifesto on Surrealism.29 Subsequently, he began to be included again in Surrealist activities, and in 1934 he provided the cov-
er drawing for a text by Breton. Magritte also claimed that the manner in which he conceived his images differed from that of the classical Surrealists. He resisted their experiments and techniques, including dream imagery, automatism and Freudian theory, maintaining the he did not believe in the subconscious and in fact found art “rebellious to psychoanalysis.”30 Andrè Breton, the leader of the Surrealist movement in Paris, considered the painter to have departed “from surrealist orthodoxy for ‘deliberate’ procedure.”31 In spite of his attempts to break from Surrealism, however, Magritte can be considered a critical force in the Surrealist movement for reasons including the affinity between his high and commercial art. His exploration of the hidden affinities between objects and his attempts to undermine reality are a few of the quintessential pursuits of the Surrealist. His depictions of women are congruent with Freudian theory, and he references Freud and his “dream-
the “idiotic work”
of renÉ magritte
— René Magritte 1966
sky bird and sabena airlines logo
the false mirror and cbs logo 32
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— René Magritte 1935
the “idiotic work”
of renÉ magritte
work” in one of his closely imitates the dream world most famous paint- than does any other Surrealist.”33 ings, The Interpreta- In that his works resemble the tion of Dreams, from commercial art of advertising, 1945. He further pornography, and cultural imagcontradicts his claim es such as postcards, “Magritte that he does not rely turns the weapon against his on dream imagery own profession, at least in its in his lecture “Life- traditional sense and being as a line,” when he de- ‘unique, authentic work of art,’ scribes how a dream obliterating the ideals of unity inspired his painting and originality and becoming Elective Affinities in a pasticheur whilst the paint32 1933. Ultimately, with the use ing becomes a ‘readymade’ (...) of his smooth, realistic imag- used as an avant-garde practice ery and by “making the figura- to interrogate and critique the tive seem literal, Magritte more ‘unexamined pretensions of high
art.’”34 The manner in which he incorporated commercial qualities into his paintings challenged the boundaries between mass culture and high art, attempting to induce the social change that was one of the main objectives of Surrealism. As a result, both his commercial, “idiotic” art and high art together may be considered one of the most radical and avant-garde bodies of work produced during the Surrealist movement. » NAR
Not your typical readymade »
Orozco’s games by
brooke conti
university of notre dame
ccording to wellknown game designers Katie Salen and Eric Zimmerman, a game “is a system in which players engage in an artificial conflict, defined by rules, that results in a quantifiable outcome.” 1 Therefore, a game is composed of three key elements that fall outside the realm of the real world—a fake conflict, imposed rules, and a
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horses running endlessly
— Gabriel Orozco 1995
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quantifiable outcome—making a game an alternate reality. Salen and Zimmerman emphasize the artificiality of games, which “maintain a boundary from socalled ‘real life’ in both time and space. Although games occur within the real world, artificiality is one of their defining features.”2 Orozco agrees that “a game is a thing on its own. You have a little world in this board or in this table, designed to perfection so you can play in a landscape.”3 However, this alternate reality is still bound in space and time like everyday reality. Humans are always out of time— never having enough time to accomplish all that they want—like games have a time limit. In one sense then, Orozco’s constant use of games should function as an escape to an alternate reality bounded by space and time. But his games are not direct “readymades,” defined by Krauss as something “transferred from the realm of the ordinary objects to
the realm of art by the mere fact of its having been inscribed by the artist.”4 They are based off of real games, but they are altered, changing the function of the game. Instead of functioning as an escape to a bound alternate reality, Orozco corrupts games, like in Horses Running Endlessly (1995), Oval With Pendulum (1996), Ping Pond Table (1998) and the Atomist works (1995), making their function an escape to the utopian ideal of an alternate reality—a timeless, limitless expanse of the world. One of Orozco’s earliest game-based works, Horses Running Endlessly, is a chessboard ‘readymade.’ During one’s initial encounter with the work, it appears to be a normal chessboard due to easily recognizable game parts. Chess pieces are present on a square playing field with characteristic neutral colored checks—black, white, and shades of brown. These are the typical colors associated with chess.
Also, the board is built from stained wood giving the viewer a familiar feeling of association with chess. Therefore, the work looks like a chessboard. Yet, the unconventional structure causes the rules of the game to break down. In fact, the board is four times the size of a chessboard. On this enlarged chessboard, made of four-color tiles, stand a troop of knights— also in four colors. The placement of the knights is completely random, “rich in potential transformations”5 On a conventional chessboard, the knights can only move in a certain “L” conformations. Here no such structure is apparent due to the placement of the knights. The viewer is potentially free to “modify the given configuration as he or she wishes,” even if it is not in accordance with the allowable moves of the knight.6 This destroys the rules that were previously defined as necessary criteria for a game. The disorganization of
the chessboard, due to a random placement of knights and enlargement, corrupts the ideal of the chess ‘readymade.’ This corruption of structure also creates an absence of artificial conflict, preventing a quantifiable end. The choice to use four colors, instead of two, relieves the tension of a potential conflict. Instead of an attack, the knights are in unison. Orozco says, “They’re running endlessly because they are all together running in this open field.”7 The lack of conflict prohibits an outcome. Orozco does not have a problem with the player inventing “a game in which the horse eats another horse and then somebody wins,” but he undercuts this statement by claiming, “it’s very boring to see horses eating each other.”8 Horses Running Endlessly was not made to have an outcome. It was made to be an endless cycle, which becomes apparent in the title of the work. The title converts knights, men of battle, to horses, strong and graceful 38
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animals. Knights are man-made while horses are beings of nature, lessening the human construct of militant conflict. Overall, the presentation of Horses Running Endlessly allows for a loss of conflict and outcome. Although Horses Running Endlessly appears to be the ‘readymade’ of a chessboard, it is clear that the two have very few associations. While chess is bounded with strict rules and limitations, Horses Running Endlessly is limitless. Therefore it does not function as an immersion into a different world—a world of a battle, attack, and skill that comprises the chess world. It functions as an escape to the utopian reality, where time and space are endless and infinite For example, there is an absence of bound time because the game is an endless cycle unlike the game of chess, which has a distinct time frame. Oval with Pendulum, like Horses Running Endlessly, appears to be another ‘readymade’
of a game that is bound in space and time and then corrupted to become boundless. Oval with Pendulum can be recognized immediately as a Billiards table. First, it is a wooden table. The legs are wood while the bed of the table, lined with green felt, sinks an inch into the table, creating a distinct edge also lined with felt, known as the cushion. In addition, there are pool balls and pool cues readily available aside the board. These are all features of a Billiards table. Although Oval with Pendulum looks like a Billiard table, it lacks organized rules. For example, this game is played with three balls—two white that remain on the table and one red that hangs from a pendulum. The balls in normal Billiards are confined to a space, like the two white balls. The red ball on the pendulum, however, represents an escape from the space of the table to an unbound space. In addition, the table is round with no pockets. Billiards is a game created off the basis of the physical laws of the universe. When two
Oval with a pendulum
— Gabriel Orozco 1996
not your typical readymade
orozco’s games
balls collide, momentum shifts, and the balls bounce in different directions due to the angles of their vectors. The square shape of a normal physics table allows for a planned course of equal but opposite angles. By making an oval table, however, there is an added degree of randomness. One can no longer easily calculate how the ball will behave when it hits the side of the table. The laws of definite space and spatial interactions applicable in normal Billiards no longer apply. Orozco’s new Billiards table more accurately reflects the sporadic and spontaneous nature of the universe. On the oval table, the ball can bound two, three, even four times; it creates an infinite series that aligns with the property of timelessness. There is no end to the action. Oval with a Pendulum, like Horses Running Endlessly, is a game without conflict. The two balls that remain on the table are not colored with stripes or
ping pond table
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— Gabriel Orozco 1998
not your typical readymade
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solids, designating the room teams, but rather they are plain white. They carry an absence of meaning. In addition, the lack of pockets leaves the game with no objective. The only rule Orozco establishes is to hit the “two balls with your own ball.”9 Oval with a Pendulum “is a game without rules,” eliminating conflict that, like in Horses Running Endlessly, creates timelessness.10 Billiards has an end—one player hits all of their designate balls into the pockets—which Oval with a Pendulum lacks. This timeless can be seen even more clearly in the direct metaphor present in the structure of the work—the pendulum. Pre-creation of Oval with Pendulum, Orozco visited the Foucault pendulum, a “ relatively large mass suspended from a long line mounted so that its perpendicular plane of swing is not confined to a particular direction and, in fact, rotates in relation to the Earth’s surface.”11 The Foucault
pendulum was responsible for proving the Earth’s rotation. By replicating the Foucault pendulum, replacing the weight with a ball, Orozco is showing the continuous movement of the Earth. Through the implementation of the pendulum, Orozco added another degree of boundlessness that is not a part of Billiards. Ping Pond Table is another game-based work that breaks down the boundaries of space and time that a ping-pong table creates. Ping Pond Table has natural associations with pingpong. When one hears Ping Pond Table, even without seeing the work, one automatically thinks of a ping-pong table due to the related phonetics. In addition, the work has paddles with which the player hits the ball like in ping-pong. Yet, the Ping Pond Table is different from a ping-pong table due to its lack of rules. A pingpong table has two sides and when a player misses the ball or hits it
out, the opposing player gains a point. However, Ping Pond Table has four sides, creating a circular movement that detracts from a point system. Since the ball travels a circle, presumably when the ball goes out, an opposing player gains a point. But since there are four opposing players, it is hard to say who gets the point. This lack of rules makes the play of the game arbitrary since no one can win. Orozco likes to claim it is a “game about how the universe is so arbitrary and how it’s constant.”12 Along there may not be a connection to the universe, there is a consistency, or rather a continuation. There is also a lack of conflict present in Ping Pond Table. The four tables make the play of the game circular allowing for a conversation between four friends instead of a battle between two enemies. Instead of bouncing the ball back-and-forth, the ball travels in a circle. Circularity is non-threatening in its lack of
confrontation. The lack of rules allows for the lack of conflict. The Ping Pond Table also contains a direct metaphor to boundlessness. While building Ping Pond Table, Orozco considered the net “that space in between two spaces” and exploited it.13 The Ping Pond Table is made of four tables, creating a tri-dimensional space in between four spaces. In the center of the table, Orozco placed a pond and a lotus that functions like the pendulum. Although he does not insist on looking at the lotus in a metaphorical sense, he likes the idea. The lotus (Sanskrit: padma) represents the “beginning of the universe” in Indian and Buddhist culture.14 It is rooted in mud, but blossoms towards the light, floating without becoming wet or muddy. It is a symbol for new life. In addition, water is a symbol for life because of its responsibility of maintaining life on Earth. This creates boundlessness because it discusses the continuation 42
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of the world. It begins with the birth of the world, but continues with the life of the Earth. As we have seen in Horses Running Endlessly, Oval with a Pendulum, and Ping Pond Table, Orozco changes games so that they are no longer bound in time and space like normal games. Orozco continues this idea in his Atomist series of prints. The prints are ‘readymades’ in the sense that they are graphics from different sports magazines or newspapers. For example, Making Strides is a graphic print of a cricket bowler, throwing the ball. Heavy Whipping is of horse jockeys racing while Crews Battle is of a crew team rowing. Bounded time and space are present in all three of these graphics. First, there are the implications of the game— a cricket game must come to an end, a derby lasts a few minutes, and a crew team is racing against time. They all take place in a limited time frame. In addition, the
— Gabriel Orozco 1996
atomists: asprilla
graphic are confined in the space of the work. Each picture is contained in a square or rectangular. The graphics capture full bodies, 44
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not letting them run outside of the space confined by the frame. The use of geometric shapes that are layered on top of the
graphic destroys their bounded quality. The Atomist series consists of “neatly arranged geometric design [that] partly obscures the action in the scenes of cricket, rowing, and other sports.”15
not your typical readymade
orozco’s games
In Making Strides, the cricket player is covered with spherical shapes, starting in the center of the figure. These spherical shapes originate from one circle placed in the center of the photo. Tangent to each sphere is another sphere, either smaller or larger. All of the spheres are bisected once or twice, creating two or four different spaces. “Rather than obliterating the photograph, […] the geometric patterns provide a rhythmic counterpoint to the overall design and enhance the dynamic motion each print conveys.”16 There are spheres placed over key joints in the cricket player’s body, allowing the viewer to play with the motion of the player’s body. The placement of the geometric shapes over the joints removes tension in the player’s body. In sports’ photos, the focus is on the flexed muscles and power involved with intense conflict. By covering these muscles, the intensity and conflict are removed. Instead, the player
becomes light and falls out of the bounds of the game world. In addition, the geometric shapes free the graphics from the frame. The elucidation of layering creates two spaces—space of the player and the space of the geometric shapes—that become intertwined with each other. Orozco establishes a new territory in the pre-made causing the graphic to appear in the abstract space created by the geometric shapes. This allows the graphic to be freed from the spatial bounds of the frame. All of Orozco’s game works focus on an escape to a utopian ideal of reality. So what is Orozco trying to do by forcing the spectator out of the everyday reality and into a utopian reality? Perhaps, there is not an overarching conclusion that can be drawn. Yet, Orozco connects the utopian reality with the world, like in the implementation of the pendulum and the pond. Instead of focusing on the bounded quality
of human nature—confined in time, society, location, etc.—he focuses on the unbounded nature of the world. Orozco could be forcing the viewer to confront the unknowable vastness, an infinite amount of unknowable information, associated with reality. Humans can never known the nature of God or what creates the laws of gravity. Orozco could also be making a commentary on globalization. The world is physically circular, making it unbounded in a spatial sense, but also since the advent of technology, the limits of communication are unbounded. Yet, perhaps, it is none of these ideas and Orozco is presenting an alternate world. For Orozco, it is merely “a new space for a new way of playing with the universe, which is a game.”17 Whatever the case, Orozco invents a new game, one transferring the viewer out of a bounded state to one of timeless, unbounded utopian state. » NAR
An exploration of the dual nature in the high renaissance »
renai | ssance by
Elaine Chow
washington university in st. louis
man,” Leon Battista Alberti once proclaimed, “can do all things if he but wills them.” This statement, spoken by someone who was at once artist, architect, poet, priest, and philosopher, put into words the spirit of the Renaissance—the newfound notion that human ability is, in essence, infinite.
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— Michelangelo Buonarroti 1508-1512
Ceiling of the Sistine Chapel
Indeed, the Renaissance witnessed a flourishing of ideas and innovations across various disciplines, especially in the artistic sphere. The pinnacle of this era, the High Renaissance, is considered to have spawned some of the best-known artists in history, and many laud this
time period as the age of creativ- gence of the utterly “new.” Howity and invention. ever, it is impossible to encap From the vantage point of sulate a movement that spans modernity, most typify the High a continent over the course of Renaissance with the afore- nearly a century in a few definimentioned characteristics: a re- tive words. In fact, the specific kindling of the classical era, a time the period began or ended distancing from the “obsolete” remains ambiguous, so in lookmedieval maniera, an emer- ing back at the High Renais-
the last supper
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sance, one must be aware that retrospective lenses are quick to label and oversimplify. The High Renaissance featured, much like any other “time period� in history, a multitude of different
styles and influences, rendering it a futile task to attempt to pin down characteristics indigenous to the period. However, that is precisely what can be recognized about the High Renais-
sance, its dichotomous qualities and its synthetic tendencies. The High Renaissance occupies a unique niche in the history of art, nestled between seemingly opposing traits; it pairs the new
— Leonardo da Vinci 1495-1498
with the old, and the Man with the Divine. In Vasari’s Lives of the Artists, one of the first works of arthistorical writing, Vasari proclaims, “It was Leonardo [Da Vinci] who originated the third style or period… he showed in his works an understanding of rule, a better knowledge of order, correct proportion, perfect design, and an inspired grace” (Vasari 2008, 253), giving praise to the innovations pioneered by the artist. Indeed, the High Renaissance featured a multitude of advancements that were rarely, if not never, demonstrated before in such perfected ways. 50
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One such advancement is the development of subtlety, from a relatively direct and didactic portrayal of symbols and subject matters to a richer, multi-
layered, and more nuanced way of rendering such themes. Dur-
ing the Middle Ages and Early Renaissance, a popular iconographic motif used in veneration was the Imago Pietatis, or the “Man of Sorrows” (Belting 1990, 131). This prototypical image depicts Christ on the cross moments after his death, with the stigmata highlighted to portray the immense physical suffering He endured from the crucifixion (Belting 1990, 131). The explicit rendering of Christ’s anguish on Calvary seeks to evoke in venerators a deep emotional response, a sympathy for Christ’s blatant and exquisite pain. Centuries later, the same motive is achieved in a much more understated way. Leonardo Da Vinci’s The Last Supper depicts the Son
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of God with his twelve apostles, sharing a last meal together before he is to be arrested (Davies et al. 2006, 560). The painting captures the moment Christ proclaims his impending betrayal and depicts the reactions of each apostle as he hears Christ’s shocking announcement. F u n d a m e n tally, the themes of the earlier Imago Pietatis and the High Renaissance The Last Supper are similar: the betrayal of Christ by a cherished friend. In the Imago Pietatis, Christ’s tortured expression, bleeding side, and wound-afflicted hands speak of the immense suffering
He underwent on behalf of man- part in betraying the friendship kind’s betrayal in the Garden of of a loving God. Similarly, Leonardo’s The Last Supper shrouds Judas Iscariot’s face in shadows, reaching for the telltale bread that reveals his imminent crime: the betrayal of Christ (Davies et al. 2006, 560). However, for those eager to cast the first stone at Judas, Leonardo reminds us through his perfected usage of linear perspective and high degree of naturalism that, we too, are part of the dinner taEden. In essence, the Imago Pi- ble—we too, are one of the traietatis tells us of our own part in tors. However, unlike the artists Christ’s crucifixion, our own part of the Imago Pietatis, Leonardo in disobedience, and our own chooses not to depict Christ’s
suffering by literally depicting Christ suffering, but by displaying a moment pregnant with tension, heavy with the potential of what is to unfold. In portraying the scene before the actual crucifixion, Leonardo presents the intimate relationship between Christ and his disciples, captured in the book of John when Christ says, “I no longer call you servants…Instead, I have called you friends, for everything that I learned from my Father have made known to you” (NIV, Jn 15:15). By doing so, Leonardo conveys the psychological aspect of the betrayal and the implied internal turmoil, rather than merely the physical pain. Similarly, The Last Supper also conveys symbolism in a much more nuanced way than its Early Renaissance ancestors, employing multilayers of meaning rather than a direct and didactic approach. In the art of the Early Renaissance, Christ’s divinity was often indicated by a halo around His head, and An52
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drea del Castagno’s rendition of the dinner scene from 1447 is an example of such practice (Davies et al. 2006, 529). Castagno’s The Last Supper depicts, once again, Christ and his twelve apostles seated at the table, but in this earlier version, Judas is identified by sitting alone on one side of the table, while the holiness of the apostles are shown through a golden disc of light hovering above their heads. In Leonardo’s The Last Supper, however, the artist attests to the divine nature of the Son of God by painting Christ’s head directly in front of an opening in the wall, letting it “act as the architectural equivalent of a halo” (Davies et al. 2006, 561). In this manner, Leonardo merely references at the presence of a halo, an innovative decision that highlights the subtlety in the piece. In addition, whereas Castagno distinguishes Judas by setting him apart from the rest of the disciples (Davies et al. 2006, 528), Leonardo simply casts Judas’ face in shadow, employing
a much less didactic technique. In such a way, Leonardo conveys meaning through not telling, but by hinting, and thus, achieves a greater sophistication and delicacy in his art than his Early Renaissance predecessors. However, despite the novelty in Leonardo’s work, it must be noted that these innovative decisions in subject matter and symbolism ultimately still rely heavily on the past. The pain of betrayal portrayed in Leonardo’s The Last Supper derives its meaning from centuries of iconographical prototypes of the same theme that have come before it, rendering the artwork a quotation of a familiar subject matter to the viewers of the time. In a similar way, the ingenuity of Leonardo’s symbolism in the painting can only be appreciated by understanding the conventions of the past, by understanding the works of earlier years he quotes in his own work. Indeed, in High Renaissance art, innovation is often lauded as one of the defining features of the period—but few realize that
— Michelangelo Buonarroti 1475-1564 after
Fall of Man and Expulsion from the Garden the past plays just as important a role in the period. Art historian Joseph Manca argues, “Despite pronouncements by his biographers concerning the revolutionary character of his accomplishments, [the High Renaissance artist] had the grace to link himself to a bygone era, to tie himself with a noble tradition, and to incorporate the old with the new” (Manca 1996,122), and indeed,
such is certainly true of an artist like Michelangelo Buonarroti. In his fresco The Fall of Man and Expulsion from the Garden of Eden on the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel, the artist paints a scene many contemporary viewers would have been familiar with: Adam and Eve succumbing to the serpent’s temptation on the left, and on the right, Adam and Eve being driven out
from Eden as a result of their original sin (Hartt 2006, 499). The subject matter is not an original one; Early Renaissance artists Masolino and Masaccio have already painted, decades earlier, their own renditions in Masolino’s The Temptation (Davies et al. 2006, 519) and Masaccio’s Expulsion from the Garden of Eden (Hartt 2006, 213). It is through his The Fall of Man and
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Expulsion from the Garden of Eden that Michelangelo takes something of the past and adapts it, making it his own and creating something new. However, in this creation of something new, few realize that the “old” is equally as important, as it was the artists of the previous ages that taught and inspired the artists of the High Renaissance such as Michelangelo. The art of the High Renaissance is indeed very much innovation, however more than that, it is a culmination of tradition and innovation. Truly then, “the earlier generation had provided artists the groundwork that enabled sixteenth-century artists to ‘surpass the age of the ancients’” (Davies et al. 2006, 555), and it is clear that the advancements of the High Renaissance are not so much invention of the new as they are a reinvention of the old, a duality of the past and the present. In addition to the dynamics between tradition and innova-
tion, the dynamics between Man and God are also greatly challenged in High Renaissance art. The beginning of the Renaissance saw the emergence of the artist as an important element in the creation of art. Whereas previously artists were thought of merely as the hands behind a work of art, the Renaissance began to see them increasingly as the mind behind a work of art. It was during the High Renaissance, however, that artists truly began to take on a highly admired, highly adored status. In this manner, the artist’s role gradually became that of a genius, and this in turn gave artist’s a heightened sense of self-awareness, an increasing consciousness of their ability to create—and thus, in essence, to rival God. Many artists of the High Renaissance clearly realized their newfound status and “saw the artist’s creativity as analogous to that of God’s” (Hartt 2006, 445). In his notebooks, Leonar-
do writes, “if the painter wishes to see the beauties that charm him, it lies in his power to create him, and if he wishes to see monstrosities that are rightful, ridiculous, or truly pitiable, he is lord and God thereof” (Hartt 2006, 445), endowing to Man the ability to be “lord and God”, if he should so desire. Indeed, Leonardo rarely ever referred to God in his writing and occasionally even made critical remarks on organized Christianity in his journals (Hartt 2006, 444). To Leonardo, the artist is The Almighty, and he writes, “the mind of the painter is transformed into a copy of the divine mind, since it operates freely in creating many kinds of animals, plans, fruits, landscapes, countrysides, ruins, and awe-inspiring places” (Hartt 2006, 445), bespeaking his absolute belief in the power of the painter’s mind. Despite the common theme of mankind’s vast potential in the artwork of many High Re-
naissance artists, it would be an oversimplification to merely pinpoint the emergence of the man’s ego as one of the characteristics of the period. Indeed, it would be easy to state that the artists of the period sought to usurp God’s job as Creator, sought to perhaps become God themselves, but the reality was simply not such, and the dynamics between Man and God in the High Renaissance can not be as readily defined. In Michelangelo’s works, a similarly complex relationship between the role of Man and the role of God can be found. In his painting of the Creation of Adam on the Sistine Chapel ceiling, the artist portrays the moment of Adam’s conception in Genesis, with God’s hand outstretched to breathe life into Adam. In this painting, Michelangelo depicts God the Father as a charged and explosive force, His body dynamic and expressive, clearly the hub of all universal power. Adam, on the other hand, is sprawled passively in the corner, body limp 56
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on of
— Michelangelo Buonarroti 1508-1512
as he awaits God’s touch. In this deliberate depiction of the two, Michelangelo comments on the relationship between God and Man, subtly reminding viewers that despite the seemingly limitless capabilities of man, we are 58
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still indebted to God for these capabilities. Indeed, unlike his older contemporary Leonardo, Michelangelo was a deeply religious man (Hartt 2006, 469), and it is evident in works of art such as the Creation of Adam that he
thought deeply about issues such as God’s role as Creator and His relationship with mankind. However, it is interesting to note that although Michelangelo clearly depicts the scene in the book of Genesis where God declares, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness” (NIV, Gen
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1:27), it is not man who is made into the likeness of God in Michelangelo’s painting, but rather God who is made into man’s likeness. This irony creates an ambiguity in the true meaning of the painting, suggesting perhaps a multilayer of intentions. Regardless, it does serve to underscore
the multifaceted nature of the relationship that develops in the High Renaissance between Man and God. The High Renaissance is a time period often associated with revolutionary advancements and the emergence of the artist as a celebrated personality. Indeed,
the High Renaissance enjoyed the creation of many unique ideas and witnessed the rising stature of the artist in society, but it also featured many more developments, some of which appear to be antithetical to the aforementioned characteristics. Indeed, this combination of different advancements served to create a unique nature for the High Renaissance that cannot be summed up with a few ascribing characteristics. With so many different key concepts in the period, a syncretism of themes resulted, and the High Renaissance developed into an era consisting of complex relationships between key issues: old and new, human and divine. Âť NAR
notes
8. Ibid., 155.
5. Ibid., 77.
9. Ibid., 160.
1» skin drawing
10. Kruass, 7.
6. Sarah Whitfield, Magritte (Brussels: Ludion, 1992), 149.
1. Krauss, Rosalind. “Line as Language: Six Artists Draw.” Preface by Peter C. Bunnell. Princeton, NJ: The Art Museum, Princeton University, 1974: 7.
11. Schiff, 149. 12. Ibid., 148. 13. Ibid., 147. 14. Ibid., 149.
2. Ibid. 3. Schiff, Richard. “Anamorphosis: Jasper Johns.” Foirades and Fizzles: Echo and Allusion in the Art of Jasper Johns. Los Angeles: Wight Art Gallery, University of California Los Angeles, 1987. 4. Schiff, 148. 5. Interview with David Sylvester, 1965. Jasper Johns: Drawings. London: Arts Council of Great Britain, 1974: 7. 6. Fuller, Peter. Jasper Johns Interviewed part II Art Monthly 19 September 1978: 7. 7. Schiff, 151. 60
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2» RenÉ Magritte 1. Mary Ann Caws, ed., Surrealist Painters and Poets: An Anthology (Cambridge and London: the MIT Press, 2001), 33. 2. Patricia Allmer and Hilde Van Gelder, eds., Collective Inventions: Surrealism in Belgium (Leuven UP, 2007), 103. 3. Ibid. 4. Stephanie Barron and Michel Draguet, eds., Magritte and Contemporary Art: The Treachery of Images (Ghent, Belgium: Ludion, 2006), 29.
7. Ibid., 63. 8. Jacques Meuris, Magritte (Koeln: Taschen, 1998), 194. 9. Ibid., 195. 10. Jackson Lears, “Uneasy Courtship: Modern Art and Modern Advertising,” American Quarterly 39.1 (Spring 1987): 151. 11. Meuris, 196. 12. Allmer and Van Gelder, 102. 13. Leopoldo Arias-Bolzmann, Goutam Chakraborty, and John C. Mowen, “Effects of Absurdity in Advertising: the Moderating Role of Product Category Attitude and the Mediating Role of Cognitive Responses,” Journal of Advertising 21.9 (Spring 2000): 36. 14. Pamela M. Homer, “A Social Adaptation Explanation of the Effects of Surrealism in Advertising,” Journal of Advertising
15.2 (1986): 50-51.
22. Whitfield, 11.
15. T.J. Lears, “The Rise of American Advertising,” The Wilson Quarterly 7.5 (Winter 1983): 164.
23. Barron and Draguet, 59.
16. Randa Dubnick, “Visible Poetry: Metaphor and Metonymy in the Paintings of Renè Magritte,” Contemporary Literature 21.3 (1980): 410, 412.
24. Philip Nel, The Avant-Garde and American Postmodernity: Small Incisive Shocks (Mississippi: University, 2002), 136. 25. Caws, Surrealist Painters and Poets, 34. 26. Ibid., 39.
17. Homer, 51-52.
27. Whitfield, 17.
18. Robin A. Greeley, “Image, Text, and the Female Body: Renè Magritte and the Surrealist Publications,” Oxford Art Journal 15.2 (1992): 48.
28. Barron and Draguet, 177.
19. Mary Ann Caws, Rudolf Kuenzli, and Gwen Raaberg, eds., Surrealism and Women (Cambridge, Massachusetts and London, England: MIT, 1991), 25. 20. Greeley, 49. 21. Susan Gubar, “Representing Pornography: Feminism, Criticism, and Depictions of Female Violation,” Critical Inquiry 13.4 (Summer 1987): 715.
29. Allmer and Van Gelder, 20. 30. Renè Magritte: The Key to Dreams (Vienna: Ludion, 2005), 15. 31. Barron and Draguet, 47. 32. Caws, Surrealist Painters and Poets, 37. 33. Dubnick, 418-19. 34. Allmer and Van Gelder, 104.
3» Orozco’s games 1. Salen, Katie and Zimmerman, Eric. Rules of Game Play: Game
Design Fundamentals. (Massachusetts Institute of Technology: 2004), 80. 2. Ibid. 3. Orozco. “Games: Ping Pong, Billiards, and Chess.” Interview by Art 21. Art 21. PBS. Web. 20 Apr. 2010. <http://www.pbs. org/art21/artists/orozco/clip1. html#>. 4. Krauss, Rosalind E. Passage in Modern Sculpture. MIT Press. 1981. 72. 5. Criqui, Jean-Pierre. “Like a rolling stone: Gabriel Orozco.” Art Forum. 1996. Accessed 20 Apr. 2010. <http://findarticles. com/p/articles/mi_m0268/ is_n8_v34/ai_18387600/> 6. Ibid. 7. Orozco, Art 21 Interview. 8. Ibid. 9. Ibid. 10. Joeslit, David. “Gabriel Orozco.” Artforum International. 1 Sep. 2000. <http://www.thefreelibrary.
notes cont. com/_/print/PrintArticle. aspx?id=65649482> 11. “Foucault pendulum.” Encyclopædia Britannica. 2010. Encyclopædia Britannica Online. 25 Apr. 2010 <http://www. britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/214686/Foucault-pendulum>. 12. Orozco, Art 21 Interview. 13. Ibid. 14. Ibid. 15. Ebony, David. “Improbable Games: Gabriel Orozco.” Art in America. 1996. Accessed 20 Apr. 2010. <http://www.artinamericamagazine.com/featuresi mprobable~games~gabriel~oroz co/print/>. 16. Ibid.
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1. Belting, Hans, Mark Bartusis, and Raymond Meyer. The Image and Its Public in the Middle Ages: Form and Function of Early Paintings of the Passion. unknown: Aristide D Caratzas Pub, 1990. 2. Davies, Penelope J.E., Walter B. Denny, Frima Fox Hofrichter, Joseph F Jacobs, Ann M. Roberts, and David L. Simon. Janson’s History of Art: The Western Tradition. 7th ed. Alexandria, VA: Prentice Hall, 2006. 3. Hartt, Frederick, and David Wilkins. History of Italian Renaissance Art. Sixth ed. Alexandria, VA: Prentice Hall, 2006. 4. Hibbard, Howard. Michelangelo (Icon Editions). 2 Sub ed. New York: HarperCollins Publishers, 1998. 5. Joannides, Paul. “”Primitivism” In the Late Drawings of Michelangelo.” Michelangelo’s Drawings 1 (1992): 245-61. 6. Kemp, Martin. Leonardo. New York: Oxford University
Press, USA, 2004. 7. Manca, Joseph. “The Gothic Leonardo: Towards a Reassessment of the Renaissance.” Artibus et Historiae 17, no. 34 (1996): 121-158. www.jstor.org (accessed April 22, 2010). 8. NIV Bible. Grand Rapids, Michigan: Zondervan, 2010. 9. Vasari, Giorgio. Lives of the Artists (Oxford World’s Classics). London: Oxford University Press, 2008.
publisher's note
T
hank you for reading the fifth publication of the Northwestern Art Review and the first of our issues for the school year 2010-2011, the Fall 2010 issue “Dualities.” I hope you have enjoyed our foray into the intrinsic dichotomies that characterize these specific artists, artworks, and movements. I am honored that an article of my own has been selected through our blind review process by the editorial staff, and I feel proud that my contributions to the group extend to our journal. The theme of this publication seems particularly fitting for our organization at this moment, as the Northwestern Art Review is currently working to increase our dual involvement with the Departments of Art History and Art Theory and Practice. A professor from each department has been appointed as an advisor to the organization in order to ensure the close communication necessary to work towards our common goals. Quarterly events such as “Coffee with a Professor” allow students to converse with Art History professors in an informal setting. In addition, NAR continually aims to increase involvement in the arts by the undergraduate community, actively promote undergraduate attendance at the Department of Art History’s Warnock Lecture
Series, the Visiting Artist Lectures scheduled by the Department of Art Theory and Practice, and events at the Mary and Leigh Block Museum of art, as well as events in Chicago. NAR has also sustained its partnership with the Block Museum of Art, collaborating in order to provide transportation for students to the Pilsen Galleries during the month of November. I would also like to thank all of our writers, readers, and supporters, without whom this publication would not have been possible. Additionally, I want to take this opportunity to express gratitude to the Block Museum of Art, the Department of Art History, the Department of Art Theory and Practice, Weinberg College of Arts and Sciences, and the Office of the Provost, who continue to provide financial support and direction to NAR. It is with their assistance that I truly believe that our organization has established a solid foundation on which to build and expand its endeavors for the remainder of the year, and I am excited to see what the future will bring for the Northwestern Art Review. Sincerely, Kari S. Rayner
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