Friday, April 3, 2009

Responses for April 10















Sander Gilman, “Black Bodies, White Bodies: Toward an Iconography of Female Sexuality in Late Nineteenth-Century Art, Medicine, and Literature,” Critical Inquiry 12, no. 1 (Autumn 1985).

Belinda Edmondson, “Black Aesthetics, Feminist Aesthetics, and the Problems of Oppositional Discourse,” in Feminist-Art-Theory: An Anthology 1968-2000, edited by Hilary Robinson (Malden, Massachusetts: Blackwell Publishing, 2001), 325-341.

Judith Wilson, “Getting Down to Get Over: Romare Bearden’s Use of Pornography and the Problem of the Black Female Body in Afro-US Art,” in Feminist-Art-Theory: An Anthology 1968-2000, edited by Hilary Robinson (Malden, Massachusetts: Blackwell Publishing, 2001), 274-280.

Valerie Smith, “Abundant Evidence: Black Women Artists of the 1960s and 70s,” in WACK! Art and the Feminist Revolution, organized by Cornelia Butler (Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, for The Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles, 2007), 400-413.

Lowery S. Sims, “Race Riots. Cocktail Parties. Black Panthers. Moon Shots and Feminists: Faith Ringgold’s Observations on the 1960s in America,” in The Expanding Discourse: Feminism and Art History, eds. Norma Broude and Mary Garrard (Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 1992), 466-473.

Frieda High W. Tesfagiorgis, “Afrofemcentrism and its Fruition in the Art of Elizabeth Catlett and Faith Ringgold,” in The Expanding Discourse: Feminism and Art History, eds. Norma Broude and Mary Garrard (Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 1992), 474-485.

13 comments:

  1. Ah! The first to blahhg for the week.
    I just read the Bearden article. Robinson says the piece Artist with Painting and Model "exemplifies his attempt to universalize black subject matter." Curious, since this article has no pictures, I googled the image, and was not all expecting the artist in the painting to be white. It seems like this choice of Bearden's contradicts Robinson's statement. I think a white artist in the work seems to reiterate the 'dark, unexplored continent allusions' about women of color that we read about before. Why white? opinions?

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  3. Hey, I thought I would weigh-in today on the blog and comment on anOther's comment/question. I too am looking at the image mentioned in Wilson's article: Romare Bearden's Artist with Painting and Model. I would like to suggest that the artist is NOT meant to be read as a white man in this image, rather as a light-skinned black man (probably Romare Bearden himself--if you look at photographs of Bearden you can see that his skin was not dark). If you look at the color Bearden uses on the artist in the image, it's not “white" or peach or pink--it's yellow. The female model, on the other hand, is a deeper, richer brown. This seems to me to signify that Bearden is depicting, within the frame of this one painting, a variety of African American skin tones.

    Here are two links for you all, one to the painting in question and one to a photo of Bearden (with his beloved kitty cat).

    http://www.nga.gov/feature/bearden/170-038.htm

    http://www.nga.gov/education/classroom/bearden/

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  4. I admire Elizabth Catlett's audacity for pushing to start of what was to be know as Afrofemcentrism- art based on afican american women's artistic manifestations. Afrofemcentristic conciousness is embedded deep into these artists, such as Faith Ringgold and Elizabeth Calett's work; showing similiar situations between the subjects in the works for example, the themes in the works: the head-face, breasts- shoulders, torso and buttocks. Head-face characteristics show spiritual resonance, the shoulders shown as massive and angular showing strength, and the breasts are modestly represented, muting the theme of nuturance or sexuality. these details "deemphasize motherhood, while re-inforcing woman's personage and action as foremost in her existence". some really great Faith quotes: "When a woman's purse is on the ground, you know something is terribly wrong."

    "I like doing things with sewing, and I don't see any reason why I shouldn't just because somebody said that's what the women do. It is what women do, so what?"

    I really love her quotes, and the viewpoints that follow behind them!

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  5. "I like doing things with sewing, and I don't see any reason why I shouldn't just because somebody said that's what the women do. It is what women do, so what?"
    I liked this quote as well. It is something that I have struggled with in my life, when I actually enjoy something that I am "supposed to" enjoy, it makes me not want to do it. The rebel in me I suppose, or maybe just the non-conformist. I guess what she is really saying is that if I don't do something just because it is what I am "supposed to" do then I am really just in a way agreeing to those roles, but rebelling against them. Anyway, I really wish I had made it to her lecture when she was here.

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  6. A topic that is a little confusing for me is that this time that we have been looking at art that has been given a specific gender/sex and all this time women have been trying to yes make a name for themselves but not be separated due to being a woman artist. Then at the very beginning of the Tesfagiorgis article one of the first things she says and she introduces herself is that " I am black…I am a woman…and I am a sculptor". So what are we seeing here? A grasp and confidence of I AM a woman artist because to me it feels like it is taking two steps back and putting yourself back into a category that many artist have been trying to break out of for a while.

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  7. in judith wilson's article i found it interesting how Bearden use of the black female form from images of pornography can be considered high art. the part im thinking of is when Wilson states that Bearden used the black female nude to rip it away from the white usage of this form to promote eroticism and white perversions. i could then consider Bearden as a feminist, yet Wilson tells of the problematics of his use of the female nude from porno conjer, such as: the voyeuristic gaze, representation of prostitution, domestication of the nude, and the restatement (wc) of the sex/gender binaries

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  8. Richelle:

    It does seem that way a little bit, but I think it may be more about getting it out there, accepting it and moving on. Who knows?

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  9. I'm suck between Siphne and Rachelle's responses to the statement about placing gender out there as a part of the artistic identity.But at the same time race is also put in the forefront. The racial identity is the most central thing here.

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  10. Judith Wilson's article brings up a lot of similar issues we've visited in the past, particularly the issue of voyeurism, prostitution, and domestication. It seems these issues are dealt with in culture, as those of ethinicities other than white are seen as "low" and these tasks are meant for "Others." The article also mentions Bearden's work suggesting of having "faces of Eve," and it brings back the religious aspect we've discussed before of Eve being the one of sin. The concept of "Other" really puts itself to play for race and gender, and I still can't quite understand where these specific labels designed for the "Other" started. I can understand a human being getting power of something and designating those who they choose as "Others," but why are the labels usually so specific?

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  11. More about Afrofemcentrism:

    I admire Elizabeth Catlett's work in the 1940's... the fact that she made a series that represented black women as being something than 'other': mother, wife, sister, etc.. when this was what all women were presented as in the works of black male artists. Catlett broke ground and gave a new voice to black women, provoking a different view of african american woman. Both Catlett and Faith Ringgold stimulated Afrofemcentrism: by the themes, rhythm, and styles of their works.

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  12. I fount Faith Ringgold to be a real statement maker for her Artistic Career. She continued to comment on the fake idea of freedom in the untied states, at a time when everyone was focusd on the white ideas of Pin-up Girls vs. G.I. Joe. She focused on using pop culture symbols and refrences to make shocking statements. For example in the Greenbook on Page 468, I always flip through the book to see the images before i really get into the text, but this time I stopped in my tracks. When i saw Faith Ringgold, Flag for the Moon: Die Nigger. I first just saw a maze in the American Flag, when i realized what it actually said I had to stop and read at that moment. I wanted to know why and wanted to know more. As an African American woman idenity was more of a need at this time and she stood up for herself no matter how many negative comments she got, she kept painting/ working on pieces that mattered rather then just painting another fake symbol for american freedom. She was real and to the point of her time.

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  13. The article, Black Bodies White Bodies, was rather interesting I thought. The assumption that overweight women were often prostitutes was kind of strange to me, but I guess it fit with how the "big black booty" was exotic and attractive to white men. I just constantly compare the readings to modern day, and this is one thing that stuck out to me. Now a days, I think prostitutes are often thought of skinny crack heads without any body fat on them. But maybe I don't know what I'm talking about, seeing as I don't go off seeking prostitutes all the time. I'm just interested in how times change.

    Also, I thought it was interesting that black women artist, put their race first, than art, than gender. They didn't want to separate from their male counterparts, unlike white women, who were only so eager to create their own world. I guess black women just have had a hard time defining their own place, as they want to be recognized first as a successful race, then as a different gender. White people have always had this advantage of superiority that white women took for granted, and didn't consider worth looking at. Only their anatomy mattered to them, not their skin type, while black women just seemed to want to help the black movement as a whole, and just be acknowledged as an equal contributor.

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