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1980-now: learning resources

Superman, World War II, and Japanese-American experience

Roger Shimomura, Diary: December 12, 1941, 1980, acrylic on canvas, 127.6 x 152.4 cm (Smithsonian American Art Museum, gift of the artist, © Roger Shimomura)
Roger Shimomura, Diary: December 12, 1941, 1980, acrylic on canvas, 127.6 x 152.4 cm (Smithsonian American Art Museum, gift of the artist, © Roger Shimomura)

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Maya Lin, Vietnam Veterans Memorial

Maya Lin, Vietnam Veterans Memorial, 1982, granite, 2 acres within Constitution Gardens, (National Mall, Washington, D.C., photo: Steven Zucker, CC BY-NC-SA 2.0)
Maya Lin, Vietnam Veterans Memorial, 1982, granite, 2 acres within Constitution Gardens, (National Mall, Washington, D.C., photo: Steven Zucker, CC BY-NC-SA 2.0)

Key points

  • The Vietnam Veterans Memorial is located on the National Mall, in between and pointing to the Washington Monument and the Lincoln Memorial. It consists of two linear cuts that descend into the earth, fronted with black granite panels. The panels contain the names of the more than 58,000 soldiers who died in the Vietnam War, in chronological order of their deaths.
  • The reflective black granite of the Memorial is meant to do two things: it allows the names to take precedence, but also allows the visitor to feel as though they are looking into the peaceful “other world” of the dead. The Monument is meant to honor the sacrifice of the individuals whose names are on the wall, and allow their loved ones to come to terms with their deaths.
  • Lin deliberately wanted to make an abstract, apolitical monument that drew attention to individual sacrifice. The contested nature of the war meant that even the black granite for the structure could not be sourced from countries where people who fled the draft had found refuge.
  • When Maya Lin won the competition to design the Memorial she was an undergraduate architecture student at Yale. When people found out about the design and who she was, there was backlash against both her and the style of the monument.
  • While the Memorial is usually referred to as a wall and conceived of as such, Maya Lin thought of it as an edge in the earth. In her words, “I had a simple impulse to cut into the earth…an initial violence and pain that in time would heal.”

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More to think about

In looking back on her design for the Vietnam Veterans Memorial, Maya Lin wrote about an assignment in one of her architecture classes that asked the students to design a memorial to World War III. “My design for a World War III memorial was a tomblike underground structure that I deliberately made to be a very futile and frustrating experience. I remember the professor of the class coming up to me afterward, saying quite angrily, “If I had a brother who died in that war, I would never want to visit this memorial.” I was somewhat puzzled that he didn’t quite understand that World War III would be of such devastation that none of us would be around to visit any memorial, and that my design was instead a pre-war commentary. In asking myself what a memorial to a third world war would be, I came up with a political statement that was meant as a deterrent.” [*] If you were going to create a memorial for a person or historical event, what would you choose, and how would you design your memorial?

Sue Coe, Aids won't wait, the enemy is here not in Kuwait

Sue Coe, Aids won't wait, the enemy is here not in Kuwait, 1990, photo-etching on paper, 23.8 x 32.5 cm (Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, © Sue Coe)
Sue Coe, Aids won't wait, the enemy is here not in Kuwait, 1990, photo-etching on paper, 23.8 x 32.5 cm (Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, © Sue Coe)

Key points

  • Although HIV/AIDS was known in the early 1980s, the crisis was initially ignored and then under-acknowledged, with research poorly funded by the American government. In large part, this lack of action was accepted because HIV/AIDS emerged in marginalized communities of gay men and intravenous drug users. This government silence framed the disease as a moral issue, rather than a medical issue and contributed to widespread fear and discrimination.
  • In 1990, the growing AIDS crisis coincided with the government’s call for a war to defend Kuwait from an Iraqi invasion. With territorial and economic interests at stake, the Gulf War was highly present in the American media. The artist juxtaposes these two crises and the attention they received from the government and the media.
  • By using the format of a battlefield, confronting the viewer with the dead and dying strewn on the ground, Sue Coe critiques media silence about the epidemic, the death and suffering of Americans, and government inaction. She asks the viewer to think about the choices made in supporting war in the Middle East rather than providing healthcare to Americans.

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More to think about

As a black and white print, Sue Coe’s AIDS won’t wait confronts the viewer with a dark, gloomy landscape and creates a stark contrast between the crisp, orderly government building and the randomly placed bodies of the dead and dying. How do these choices help to convey her political message?
Think of a visual image from today that deals with a contemporary crisis. How does that artist make their meaning clear to the viewer? Do you think that messages like this are effective in creating change?

A desert on fire, Salgado photographs Kuwait

Sebastião Salgado, Kuwait, 1991, gelatin silver print, 45.24 × 30.1 cm (Los Angeles County Museum of Art, gift of Gary Sato, AC1998.162.1, ©Sebastião Salgado)
Sebastião Salgado, Kuwait, 1991, gelatin silver print, 45.24 × 30.1 cm (Los Angeles County Museum of Art, gift of Gary Sato, AC1998.162.1, ©Sebastião Salgado)

Key points

  • In 1990, Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein led an invasion of its oil-rich neighbor, Kuwait. An international coalition, led by the United States, forced his withdrawal in February 1991. As Iraqi troops fled, they were ordered to set fire to 605 oil wells, causing one of the world’s greatest environmental disasters.
  • Photographer Sebastião Salgado documents geopolitical actions that have widespread impact; during this crisis, he was on assignment in Kuwait and captured an image of the dangerous labor required to extinguish these fires and cap the oil wells. He described the scene as a living hell, as these workers were surrounded by flammable pools of oil and endless fields of fire in the aftermath of the war.
  • While this photograph conveys the hazards and labors of these highly-skilled workers, Salgado uses a range of sensuous tonalities to create a work of fine art. Coated in oil, the men look like bronze sculptures, frozen in time. Trained as an economist, Salgado’s work often features labor and aims to inspire political action.

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More to think about

In this work, Salgado creates a strikingly beautiful image of a devastating environmental tragedy. Why do you think he might have chosen such a visually-appealing presentation? Does this help the photograph to have a greater effect on society and bring about change? Why or why not?

History and deception: Kenseth Armstead’s Surrender Yorktown 1781

Kenseth Armstead, Surrender Yorktown 1781 (2013), graphite on paper, 86 x 68 inches (Newark Museum, © 2012 Kenseth Armstead)
Kenseth Armstead, Surrender Yorktown 1781 (2013), graphite on paper, 86 x 68 inches (Newark Museum, © 2012 Kenseth Armstead)

Key points

  • The British defeat at Yorktown was a decisive victory in the American Revolutionary War, made possible through the combined efforts of the American Continental Army (led by George Washington) and the French Army and Navy. This drawing is based on Louis-Nicolas van Blarenberghe’s painting, The Surrender of Yorktown (1786), which was commissioned by King Louis XVI to celebrate the victory.
  • Kenseth Armstead’s drawing technique highlights his creative process in order to remind the viewer that historical images are constructions that must be made. Armstead points out that neither van Blarenberghe nor his patron had ever been to America. The original painting creates an illusion of the event that is pure fantasy, but makes it seem like we’re looking at the truth.
  • In his work, Armstead removed the fictional elements of van Blarenberghe’s painting, which results in an empty and desolate landscape where a massive battle had taken place. This emptiness points out that truths often go missing from historical depictions, notably the contributions of enslaved African-Americans who made up 20% of the soldiers fighting in the Revolutionary War. Armstead wants us to realize that all histories are incomplete.

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More to think about

Emanuel Leutze, Washington Crossing the Delaware, 1851, oil on canvas, 378.5 x 647.7 cm (Metropolitan Museum of Art)
Emanuel Leutze, Washington Crossing the Delaware, 1851, oil on canvas, 378.5 x 647.7 cm (Metropolitan Museum of Art)
Kenseth Armstead erases a conventional historical rendering of the Battle of Yorktown, both to call our attention to the constructed and highly invented nature of history painting and to suggest the realities omitted from these accounts. Working in small groups, take a critical look at Emmanuel Leutze’s iconic Washington Crossing the Delaware. What elements of this painting might not be historically accurate? What changes would you make to create a more truthful version?
Today, photographs are frequently used to record historical moments and commemorate public events. Discuss with a classmate whether you think photographs can be trusted to present truthful accounts. Find an example of a news photograph and look at it critically for ways the image may skew or manipulate the viewer’s understanding of what really happened.

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