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Added by: Hans Maes
Summary: Argues that the introduction of photography did not significantly interfere with, or terminate, the àkó legacy of portraiture. Shows instead that the stylistic elements of the àkó life-size burial effigy – a sculpted portrait that attempts to capture the physical likeness, identity, character, social status of a deceased parent – informed the photographic traditional formal portrait in Òwò, Nigeria.Fusco, Coco. The Other History of Intercultural Performance1994, The Drama Review 38(1): 143-167.-
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Added by: Rossen Ventzislavov
Summary: Fusco's text chronicles the preparation, performance, and public reception of an artwork - "Two Undiscovered Amerindians" - she created in collaboration with Guillermo Gómez-Peña in 1992. The performance was intended as a critique of the contemporary artworld, whose shallow redemptive multiculturalism often sidelined important issues of racial difference and racialized aesthetic perception. It consisted of the two artists spending three days in a golden cage presented, in the manner of live ethnographic spectacles of the not so distant colonial past, as members of an exotic and newly discovered island nation in the Gulf of Mexico. Fusco contends that otherness is always performative and, as such, has held the entire history of performance art - from the Dadaists to the present day - captive. The resulting frequent gestures of appropriation, condescension and erasure discredit the social and intercultural consciousness most performance artists see themselves as representing. Ironically, the strange journey the "Two Undiscovered Amerindians" project has travelled has plentifully confirmed the iniquities the two artists set out to expose.Comment: While not a philosophical text per se, this article is very helpful in discussions of the political dimension of the contemporary artworld, and the race dynamics within it.
Karlström, Anna. Authenticity2015, In Heritage Keywords, edited by Kathryn Lafrenz Samuels and Trinidad Rico. USA: University Press of Colorado.-
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Added by: Erich Hatala Matthes
Summary: This text offers a brief overview of some approaches to the concept of authenticity in international heritage management. Focusing on a case study of Buddhist sites in Laos, Karlström then argues that culturally specific understandings of authenticity pose problems for the universal application of a preservationist approach to heritage management. It concludes with some open-ended questions about how we should pursue alternative approaches.Comment: This is a good text for instructors who want to discuses authenticity in the context of a reasonably in-depth look at a particular non-Western cultural context. While the article itself is light on conceptual/ philosophical work, if offers useful material for philosophical analysis and discussion. It would pair well with the theoretical framework provided in Yuriko Saito's "Why Restore Works of Art?", or the alternative approach to authenticity captured in Carolyn Korsmeyer's "Real Old Things."
Root, Deborah. Fat-Eaters and Aesthetes: The Politics of Display1996, in Cannibal Culture: Art, Appropriation, and the Commodification of Difference. USA: Westview Press.-
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Added by: Erich Hatala Matthes
Summary: Root employs Méxica mythology as a lens for revealing the consumptive, and even cannibalistic, character of power. In particular, she points to the way colonial power sets up Westerners as "experts" and arbiters of art and culture, presenting appreciation of culture as a pretext for violence and control.Comment: This chapter serves as an introduction to Root's booklength study of these themes, so the presentation only gestures at these relationships and provides a brief selection of examples that illustrate them. However, if can be useful for raising initial questions about the relationships among power, art, and culture. It provides a counterpoint to a more sanguine perspective on cross-cultural appreciation expressed by Thomas Heyd in "Rock Art Aesthetics and Cultural Appropriation."
Todd, Loretta. Notes on Appropriation1990, Parallelogramme 16(1): 24-33.-
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Added by: Erich Hatala Matthes
Summary: Todd (Métis) situates contemporary acts of cultural appropriation in the colonial appropriation of indigenous land. She offers a normative definition of cultural appropriation according to which it is understood as the opposite of cultural autonomy. In the course of her discussion, she responds to a number of defenses of cultural appropriation that, she argues, fail to recognize the asymmetries of power in which appropriation from indigenous communities is embedded.Comment: This is an excellent text to use in order to present students with a conception of the wrong of cultural appropriation that is firmly rooted in the context of colonial power dynamics. It is short, and can be usefully compared and contrasted with the arguments presented by James O. Young in "Profound Offense and Cultural Appropriation.".
Smalls, James. African-American Self-Portraiture2001, Third Text, pp. 47-62.-
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Added by: Hans Maes
Summary: As 'always already' racialized object of the white patriarchal look African-Americans have enduringly suffered from having to negotiate notions of the self from a crisis position. The act of self-portraiture for the African-American artist has the value of bestowing upon the self-portraitist a sense of empowerment.Comment: Useful in discussing portraiture and depiction, as well as empowerment and art's role in power relations in general.
Artworks to use with this text:
Lyle Ashton Harris, Construct #10 (collection of the artist, 1988)
Harris's self-portraits are redemptive and liberatory in their focus on the self. They challenge standard discourse on identity and subjectivity to present a new sign of black power and liberation. Because his photographs expose gender as constructed and performed, they also, in the process, subvert phallocentrism and compulsory heterosexuality. Useful in discussing portraiture and depiction, as well as empowerment and art's role in power relations in general.
Artworks to use with this text:
Lyle Ashton Harris, Construct #10 (collection of the artist, 1988)
Harris's self-portraits are redemptive and liberatory in their focus on the self. They challenge standard discourse on identity and subjectivity to present a new sign of black power and liberation. Because his photographs expose gender as constructed and performed, they also, in the process, subvert phallocentrism and compulsory heterosexuality.
Steinbock, Eliza. Generative Negatives: Del LaGrace Volcano’s Herm Body Photographs2014, Transgender Studies Quarterly 1(4): 539-551.-
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Added by: Hans Maes
Summary: In conventional film photography, negatives are used in the darkroom to produce positive images, but in the outmoded medium Polaroid 665 the positive image is used to make a unique negative that can then be employed to make positive prints in the future. This generativity of the Polaroid 665 negative is used by the artist to mirror the complexity of feelings regarding intersex bodies. The series shows how negative affect can be productive and political, even when it appears to suspend agency.Comment: Useful in discussing portraiture and depiction, as well as empowerment and art's role in power relations in general.
Artworks to use with this text:
Del LaGrace Volcano, Herm Body (2011- )
Self-portraits which clearly reference the work of John Coplans and reflect on Volcano’s midlife embodiment changed by hormones, age, and weight. The title draws attention to the materiality of its subject, insisting that we receive the body as ‘herm’ – a word Volcano uses to name intersex history and claim trans embodiment. Useful in discussing portraiture and depiction, as well as empowerment and art's role in power relations in general.
Artworks to use with this text:
Del LaGrace Volcano, Herm Body (2011- )
Self-portraits which clearly reference the work of John Coplans and reflect on Volcano’s midlife embodiment changed by hormones, age, and weight. The title draws attention to the materiality of its subject, insisting that we receive the body as ‘herm’ – a word Volcano uses to name intersex history and claim trans embodiment.
Garland-Thomson, Rosemarie. Picturing People with Disabilities: classical portraiture as reconstructive narrative2010, in: Richard Sandell, Jocelyn Dodd, & Rosemarie Garland-Thomson, Re-presenting Disability: Activism and Agency in the Museum, London: Routledge, pp. 179-193.-
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Added by: Hans Maes
Summary: Provides a close reading of formal portraits of people with disabilities. Focuses on the fundamental elements of traditional portraiture: frame, pose, costume, likeness. Central argument: a conservative representational genre can act in the service of a progressive politics. Through framing, pose, costume, and likeness portraits accord dignity, authority, and symbolic capital to disabled subjects.Comment: Useful in discussing portraiture and depiction, as well as empowerment and art's role in power relations in general.
Artworks to use with this text:
Doug Auld, Shayla (2005) Portrait of a black woman with significant burn scars
Compared and contrasted with Gilbert Stuart's portrait of George Washington (1810).
Sasha Newley, Christopher Reeve (2004)
Juxtaposed with earlier iconic portraits of the 'man of steel'.
Marc Quinn, Alison Lapper Pregnant (2006)
Powerfully asserting that a woman with significant disabilities who is evidently sexual, about to become a mother, is worthy of being seen on the Fourth Plinth in Trafalgar Square. Useful in discussing portraiture and depiction, as well as empowerment and art's role in power relations in general.
Artworks to use with this text:
Doug Auld, Shayla (2005) Portrait of a black woman with significant burn scars
Compared and contrasted with Gilbert Stuart's portrait of George Washington (1810).
Sasha Newley, Christopher Reeve (2004)
Juxtaposed with earlier iconic portraits of the 'man of steel'.
Marc Quinn, Alison Lapper Pregnant (2006)
Powerfully asserting that a woman with significant disabilities who is evidently sexual, about to become a mother, is worthy of being seen on the Fourth Plinth in Trafalgar Square.
Chino, Kaori. A Man Pretending to Be a Woman: On Yasumasa Morimura’s “Actresses”2000, in: Brand, Peg Zeglin (ed.), Beauty Matters, Bloomington: Indiana University Press, pp. 252-265.-
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Added by: Hans Maes
Summary: Argues that Morimura's portraits achieve something that depictions of the female body rarely can. Morimura invites the violent male gaze with his exposed body and then, in the next moment, snubs and nullifies it. With references to Andy Warhol's portraits of Marilyn Monroe and Cindy Sherman's work.Comment: Useful in discussing portraiture and depiction, and objectification in general.
Artworks to use with this text:
Yasumasa Morimura, Descent of the Actresses (1994)
Self-portraits in which the artists impersonates famous actresses. Useful in discussing portraiture and depiction, and objectification in general.
Artworks to use with this text:
Yasumasa Morimura, Descent of the Actresses (1994)
Self-portraits in which the artists impersonates famous actresses.
Pointon, Marcia. Slavery and the Possibility of Portraiture2013, in: Portrayal and the Search for Identity, Reaktion Books, pp. 47-73.-
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Added by: Hans Maes
Summary: Draws attention to the fact that portraits of slaves are rarely exhibited or discussed; and that not all images of slaves are portraits. Reflects on the dynamics of power involved in portraiture and on the relation between subject and viewer in particular. Includes extensive commentary on the historical development of portraiture and the place of portraits of slaves therein.Comment: Useful in discussing portraiture and depiction, as well as power relations and art's role in them in general.
Artworks to use with this text:
Francis Wheatley, A Family Group in a Landscape (c.1775)
A dark clad black boy stands motionless at the extreme left of the canvass, scarcely making into the group. He is literally in the shadows. Useful in discussing portraiture and depiction, as well as power relations and art's role in them in general.
Artworks to use with this text:
Francis Wheatley, A Family Group in a Landscape (c.1775)
A dark clad black boy stands motionless at the extreme left of the canvass, scarcely making into the group. He is literally in the shadows.
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Abíódún, Rowland. Àkó-graphy: Òwò Portraits
2013, in: John Peffer and Elisabeth L. Cameron (eds.), Portraiture & Photography in Africa, Bloomington and Indianapolis: Indiana University Press, pp. 287-312.
Comment: Useful in discussing portraiture, as well as depiction and representation in general.
Artworks to use with this text:
Mamah, Carved, life-size, fully dressed second-burial effigy for Madam Aládé, EÌpelè- Òwò, Nigeria (1972)
Striking example of the practice. Demonstrates how the àkó tradition appears to have influenced the way elderly people posed for photographs. Useful in discussing portraiture, as well as depiction and representation in general.
Artworks to use with this text:
Mamah, Carved, life-size, fully dressed second-burial effigy for Madam Aládé, EÌpelè- Òwò, Nigeria (1972)
Striking example of the practice. Demonstrates how the àkó tradition appears to have influenced the way elderly people posed for photographs.