Some Notes on Political Art

Some Notes on Political Art
by "Caoimhghin O Croidheain" caoimhghin@yahoo.com
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What is political art? What makes art political?
It is very difficult to define political art. Views onwhat makes art political can range from the idea thatall art is political (i.e. it either implicitlysupports or explicitly opposes the status quo) topointing out, for example, the obviously politicalmurals on walls around Belfast. As a way of narrowingthe former and broadening the latter I suggest here aview of political art that uses three categories:Portrayal, Promotion, or Projection.

Portrayal

In the first category ‘Portrayal’ covers art that says‘this is what happens if, is happening now or happenedin the past’. This kind of art describes events orsituations that people find themselves in as a resultof social or political structures. Any politicalperspective is implicit in the art but is alsofree-floating. For example, a painting of a white manwhipping black slaves describes a particular situationwhere the black man may say, ‘Yes! That is how we aretreated!’ yet the slave-owner may say, ‘Yes! That isthe way to treat them!’ Thus both sides can see theconfirmation of their point of view in the work ofart.

For the slaves, the ultimate effect of such art may bepositive or negative. In a positive sense it maycreate group awareness and solidarity, or, in anegative sense, it could also consolidate inertia, afeeling that nothing can be done to change thesituation. The art styles or movements of Realism,Social Realism and Naturalism could fit into thecategory of ‘Portrayal’.

Promotion

In the second category of ‘Promotion’ ways and meanstowards the resolution of the problem are presented.That is, a particular aspect of an event ishighlighted over other aspects. This aspect wouldconcentrate on the people or groups who are activelystruggling to change the situation in which they findthemselves. Thus one view of an event, that which would encourageothers or strengthen an activism already present, ispromoted over images of the event that may have theopposite effect. In this case, the politics ofrepresentation takes precedence over therepresentation of politics. Unlike ‘Portrayal’, this type of art is harder tomanipulate from an opposing point of view. Thepolitics is generally explicit and can have a positiveinspirational effect. The art styles or movements ofSocialist Realism and ‘Political Art’ (e.g. murals,banners, posters etc.) and Social Realism to a certainextent could fit into the category of ‘Promotion’.

Projection

In the third and last category ‘Projection’ refers toart that takes disparate elements and then recombinesthem to form a new image. It is an art which says‘This is what could happen or could be if ...’. Artstyles or movements such as Surrealism, collage,utopian or visionary images would fit into thiscategory. Such speculative art can have a positiveeffect of providing inspiration by suggesting ideasthat are outside one’s usual ways of thinking, and canbe implicitly or explicitly political.
For example, a picture showing the Rock of Cashel(ancient fortress in Co. Tipperary, Ireland) with aJapanese Shinkansen bullet train speeding by may be ajarring conjunction of images but suggests thepossibility of a super fast transport system inIreland. Therefore it has social and economicimplications for the Irish State which in turn makesit implicitly political.
However, like in the first category Portrayal,opposing political viewpoints can claim this image fortheir vision of the future. The same scene would beexplicitly political though, if, for example, ‘Workers of the world unite’ was written on the sideof the Shinkansen.
Thus it can be seen from the above categories that therepresentation of particular actions or the inclusionof particular types of text ties an image down to anexplicitly political perspective. The past, presentand future, with some overlapping, are also covered inthis way of seeing or defining political art.
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Further to my previous post on political art, anothercomment of John's struck me:
'Something about the role of the artist ininterpreting rather than documenting, perhaps?'

While I am taking photos am I documenting orinterpreting? I feel that I am doing both at the sametime. I am documenting in the sense that the image isa representation of a real event yet I am alsointerpreting in that what I choose to photograph[particular objects and places in time; particularconjunctions of objects] is highly interpretative. Howdo I separate out the two? Can I ever have control ofthe content? If a painting includes the latestMercedes car as a symbol of Ireland's burgeoningcapitalism, how do I know that a potential buyer isinterested in buying it because it represents his/herworld outlook and feelings of pride in Ireland'sburgeoning capitalism? How does the viewer know if I,the artist, included it as a type of criticism? MaybeI am not being critical but delighted with this newIreland. Does that mean that ultimately I can onlyreflect what is out there and with the passing of timethe image can be seen in its true context? [supposingof course that time is kind to my socio/politicaloutlook]. More and more I feel that I can onlyrepresent what is out there.
Everything I represent is a symbol of the now whichwill resonate differently with different people. Yetmaybe the fact of its representation makes itsexistence inescapable which is itself a form ofpolitical statement. That car did exist, and it couldonly exist because of a particular socio/politicalsituation pertaining in that society at that time.

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I think that John is right when he says:
'But it is much harder, it seems to me,for art to be able to offer social critique - thatis, criticisms of the systems of social power andresultant structured social inequalities. Perhaps thisis due to this more important task simply being amore difficult thing to do; perhaps it is a symptom of artistic expression itself'

As an artist I have been trying to deal with thisproblem/issue for some years now. Previously I dealtwith it by offering positive images of what could bedone [as opposed to being 'agin capitalism'] byportraying people 'producing' rather than 'consuming'[eg playing music, doing traditional dance,demonstrating etc]. Then I worked on historical imagesof same and incorporated radical political leaders inIrish history. But I felt that this was becoming verylimited. I wanted to take control of the source of theimages too. It struck me that politics was all aroundme and I just had to go and find it. I went intoDublin city with my camera and looked around. Inoticed contrasts between the historical statues andtheir surroundings. I noticed Brinks vans coming outof shopping streets as shoppers went in. I saw the newAsian, African, and Russian shops on Moore streetwhich had been the domain of Irish working classstreet sellers. I took many fotos and worked on a newseries of paintings which I called 'Dublin: A City ofContrasts'. [see http://gaelart.net/].
I also tried to set out why it is hard for 'art to beable to offer social critique - that is, criticisms ofthe systems of social power and resultant structuredsocial inequalities' which I reproduce below. [It canalso be read with relevant illustrations on my artsite as well as notes on the Dublin series]