Williams, Fred (1927–1982)

Author(s):  
Darren Jorgensen

Fred Williams was an Australian painter and printmaker who bridged the gulf between the country’s landscape painters and contemporary art. In the 1960s he turned the sparseness of the Australian countryside into pictures that resembled the international trends toward abstraction and minimalism. These were large, sparse canvases dotted with colorful blobs that alluded to the great spaces and minimal features of the Australian countryside. Williams’s other influential series include paintings of densely packed trees in Sherbrooke Forest in the late 1950s and early 1960s, as well as landscapes of the Pilbara region in the early 1980s, just before his death. The Pilbara Series would come to be his best known work, yet they were also the most conservative of Williams’s pictures, as they portray the ranges and riverbeds of this region with a naturalism redolent of classical landscape painting. In these works, it is as if the radical break that took place in Australian art in the 1960s and 1970s had never happened—that is, that the influence of contemporary art had not succeeded in making itself felt.


Author(s):  
Elena Shtromberg

The history of exhibitions in Brazil during the 1960s and 1970s provides a key reference point for understanding how artistic vanguards and contemporary art unfolded in direct relationship to social and political contexts. The seminal exhibitions during these pivotal decades elucidate how the contemporary in Brazilian art stages and reframes conceptions of the “new” vis-à-vis the art object. The exhibitions in question trace the development of Ferreira Gullar’s não-objeto (non-object, 1959) and its path toward the idea-based artwork, an impulse that was prevalent throughout the 1960s in the United States and Europe as well. Inaugurated by the emergence of Brasília, Brazil’s new capital city in the formerly barren hinterlands of the state of Goiás, the 1960s witnessed a new model of artistic practice that pushed the boundaries between art and life, actively seeking out the participation of the viewer. This is most evidenced in the canonical work of artists Hélio Oiticica and Lygia Clark. By the 1970s, challenges to the utopian undertakings from the previous decades had become imbricated with political activism, as artists and intellectuals alike pronounced a commitment to the quest for democracy after the military coup of 1964. The 1970s also witnessed heightened artistic engagement with new information and communication technologies, including the use of video equipment and computers. Constructing the history of Brazil’s contemporary art via the most important moments of its display will not only historically and politically contextualize some of the groundbreaking artists and artworks of these two decades, but also introduce readers to the challenges that these artworks posed to the more traditional methods of institutional display and the criteria used to interpret them.



ARTMargins ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 7 (3) ◽  
pp. 34-56
Author(s):  
Claire F. Fox

During the 1960s and 1970s, the Visual Arts Department of the Pan American Union, headquarters of the Organization of American States (OAS) in Washington, D.C., produced nearly fifty 16mm documentary short films on topics ranging from contemporary art to heritage sites and OAS member countries. This article focuses on a cluster of three titles about Peru directed by curator and critic José Gómez Sicre between approximately 1964 and 1968. Produced with funding from an international affiliate of Esso Standard Oil, the films were shot on location and demonstrate careful attention to the contexts of art production within an emerging cultural policy framework that cast art and heritage as engines of regional cultural development. The films further assert that the antiquities and modern art markets might be synchronized to become a generational taste formation, insofar as they identify classes of affordable artifacts that were finding their way to collectors relatively recently, and which had also inspired the work of postwar Peruvian artists. As an ensemble, the films reveal unexplored interactions between contemporary art movements, the development of heritage districts and site museums, and emergent cultural policies that continue to impact hemispheric American locations.



2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
◽  
Marcus T. G. Moore

<p><b>This thesis examines the reception to Marcel Duchamp in New Zealand from 1965 to 2007. It takes as its subject two exceptional occasions when Duchamp’s work arrived in New Zealand and the various ways in which select New Zealand artists have responded to his work since that date. In doing so, this thesis acknowledges the shifting ideologies that underpin the reception of Duchamp which are characteristic of each decade. Thus it reads Duchamp’s reception through the conceptual and ‘linguistic turn’ in post-formalist practices in the late 1960s and 1970s; the neo-avantgarde strategies of the late 1970s and 1980s; a third-wave response to the readymade in the 1990s − which leads to an expanded notion of art as installation practice in the mid- to late 1990s. Finally, it offers a take on the readymade paradigm after post-modernism, as seen in a return to artisanal craft.</b></p> <p>This historical account of artistic practice in New Zealand is woven around two remarkable events that entailed Duchamp’s works actually coming to New Zealand, which I reconstruct for the first time. These are: Marcel Duchamp 78 Works: The Mary Sisler Collection (1904–1963), the exhibition that toured Auckland, Wellington and Christchurch in 1967; and the bequest of Judge Julius Isaacs and Betty Isaacs to the National Art Gallery in 1982 which included three works by Duchamp. The first took place in the 1960s during the first wave of exhibitions that brought Duchamp to a global audience. Here I argue that, rather than a belated response, this was contemporaneous with other events, proving that New Zealand was an active participant in the initial global reception of Duchamp. The second concerns the process by which Duchamp’s works entered a public collection. Here, I offer an account that reveals the uniqueness of Duchamp’s gifting of artworks to friends, and argues for the special importance of this gift, given the scarcity of Duchamp’s work, due to his limited output.</p> <p>This thesis also reads Duchamp through the lens provided by New Zealand’s situation on the periphery. Thus it offers an analysis of Duchamp’s life and work that, while acknowledging his centrality in twentieth-century art, takes from his example those components of his practice deemed relevant to the situation of art and artists here in New Zealand. By this means I locate those elements of Duchamp’s life story, his work and legacy that tell us something new about how to diffuse the power of the centre. Drawing on the consequences of the processes of decentralisation that have reshaped the landscape of global culture, this account reveals new relationships between margin and centre that provide new ways to connect Duchamp with subsequent generations of New Zealand artists. The aim here is to defy the assumed separation of New Zealand from international trends, rethink our subservient ties to England, to offer a new version of a local art history that knits our artists into a global mainstream without rendering them beholden to a master narrative that derives from elsewhere.</p>



2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
◽  
Marcus T. G. Moore

<p><b>This thesis examines the reception to Marcel Duchamp in New Zealand from 1965 to 2007. It takes as its subject two exceptional occasions when Duchamp’s work arrived in New Zealand and the various ways in which select New Zealand artists have responded to his work since that date. In doing so, this thesis acknowledges the shifting ideologies that underpin the reception of Duchamp which are characteristic of each decade. Thus it reads Duchamp’s reception through the conceptual and ‘linguistic turn’ in post-formalist practices in the late 1960s and 1970s; the neo-avantgarde strategies of the late 1970s and 1980s; a third-wave response to the readymade in the 1990s − which leads to an expanded notion of art as installation practice in the mid- to late 1990s. Finally, it offers a take on the readymade paradigm after post-modernism, as seen in a return to artisanal craft.</b></p> <p>This historical account of artistic practice in New Zealand is woven around two remarkable events that entailed Duchamp’s works actually coming to New Zealand, which I reconstruct for the first time. These are: Marcel Duchamp 78 Works: The Mary Sisler Collection (1904–1963), the exhibition that toured Auckland, Wellington and Christchurch in 1967; and the bequest of Judge Julius Isaacs and Betty Isaacs to the National Art Gallery in 1982 which included three works by Duchamp. The first took place in the 1960s during the first wave of exhibitions that brought Duchamp to a global audience. Here I argue that, rather than a belated response, this was contemporaneous with other events, proving that New Zealand was an active participant in the initial global reception of Duchamp. The second concerns the process by which Duchamp’s works entered a public collection. Here, I offer an account that reveals the uniqueness of Duchamp’s gifting of artworks to friends, and argues for the special importance of this gift, given the scarcity of Duchamp’s work, due to his limited output.</p> <p>This thesis also reads Duchamp through the lens provided by New Zealand’s situation on the periphery. Thus it offers an analysis of Duchamp’s life and work that, while acknowledging his centrality in twentieth-century art, takes from his example those components of his practice deemed relevant to the situation of art and artists here in New Zealand. By this means I locate those elements of Duchamp’s life story, his work and legacy that tell us something new about how to diffuse the power of the centre. Drawing on the consequences of the processes of decentralisation that have reshaped the landscape of global culture, this account reveals new relationships between margin and centre that provide new ways to connect Duchamp with subsequent generations of New Zealand artists. The aim here is to defy the assumed separation of New Zealand from international trends, rethink our subservient ties to England, to offer a new version of a local art history that knits our artists into a global mainstream without rendering them beholden to a master narrative that derives from elsewhere.</p>



Arts ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 9 (1) ◽  
pp. 21 ◽  
Author(s):  
Naomi Simhony

This article examines three exceptional synagogues designed in Israel in the 1960s and 1970s. It aims to explore the tension between these iconic structures and the artworks integrated into them. The investigation of each case study is comprised of a survey of the architecture and interior design, and of ceremonial objects and Jewish art pieces. Against the backdrop of contemporary international trends, the article distinguishes between adopted styles and genuine (i.e., originally conceived) design processes. The case studies reveal a shared tendency to abstract religious symbolism while formulating a new Jewish-national visual canon.



2015 ◽  
Vol 12 (4) ◽  
pp. 539-555 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kevin M. Flanagan

This article traces Ken Russell's explorations of war and wartime experience over the course of his career. In particular, it argues that Russell's scattered attempts at coming to terms with war, the rise of fascism and memorialisation are best understood in terms of a combination of Russell's own tastes and personal style, wider stylistic and thematic trends in Euro-American cinema during the 1960s and 1970s, and discourses of collective national experience. In addition to identifying Russell's recurrent techniques, this article focuses on how the residual impacts of the First and Second World Wars appear in his favoured genres: literary adaptations and composer biopics. Although the article looks for patterns and similarities in Russell's war output, it differentiates between his First and Second World War films by indicating how he engages with, and temporarily inhabits, the stylistic regime of the enemy within the latter group.



2013 ◽  
Vol 10 (1) ◽  
pp. 27-48 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alan Burton

Brainwashing assumed the proportions of a cultural fantasy during the Cold War period. The article examines the various political, scientific and cultural contexts of brainwashing, and proceeds to a consideration of the place of mind control in British spy dramas made for cinema and television in the 1960s and 1970s. Particular attention is given to the films The Mind Benders (1963) and The Ipcress File (1965), and to the television dramas Man in a Suitcase (1967–8), The Prisoner (1967–8) and Callan (1967–81), which gave expression to the anxieties surrounding thought-control. Attention is given to the scientific background to the representations of brainwashing, and the significance of spy scandals, treasons and treacheries as a distinct context to the appearance of brainwashing on British screens.



2016 ◽  
Vol 25 (3) ◽  
pp. 294-316 ◽  
Author(s):  
Chik Collins ◽  
Ian Levitt

This article reports findings of research into the far-reaching plan to ‘modernise’ the Scottish economy, which emerged from the mid-late 1950s and was formally adopted by government in the early 1960s. It shows the growing awareness amongst policy-makers from the mid-1960s as to the profoundly deleterious effects the implementation of the plan was having on Glasgow. By 1971 these effects were understood to be substantial with likely severe consequences for the future. Nonetheless, there was no proportionate adjustment to the regional policy which was creating these understood ‘unwanted’ outcomes, even when such was proposed by the Secretary of State for Scotland. After presenting these findings, the paper offers some consideration as to their relevance to the task of accounting for Glasgow's ‘excess mortality’. It is suggested that regional policy can be seen to have contributed to the accumulation of ‘vulnerabilities’, particularly in Glasgow but also more widely in Scotland, during the 1960s and 1970s, and that the impact of the post-1979 UK government policy agenda on these vulnerabilities is likely to have been salient in the increase in ‘excess mortality’ evident in subsequent years.



2018 ◽  
Vol 11 (1-2) ◽  
pp. 189-216
Author(s):  
Jamil Hilal

The mid-1960s saw the beginnings of the construction of a Palestinian political field after it collapsed in 1948, when, with the British government’s support of the Zionist movement, which succeeded in establishing the state of Israel, the Palestinian national movement was crushed. This article focuses mainly on the Palestinian political field as it developed in the 1960s and 1970s, the beginnings of its fragmentation in the 1990s, and its almost complete collapse in the first decade of this century. It was developed on a structure characterized by the dominance of a center where the political leadership functioned. The center, however, was established outside historic Palestine. This paper examines the components and dynamics of the relationship between the center and the peripheries, and the causes of the decline of this center and its eventual disappearance, leaving the constituents of the Palestinian people under local political leadership following the collapse of the national representation institutions, that is, the political, organizational, military, cultural institutions and sectorial organizations (women, workers, students, etc.) that made up the PLO and its frameworks. The paper suggests that the decline of the political field as a national field does not mean the disintegration of the cultural field. There are, in fact, indications that the cultural field has a new vitality that deserves much more attention than it is currently assigned.



2015 ◽  
Vol 33 (3) ◽  
pp. 88-107
Author(s):  
Louise K. Davidson-Schmich ◽  
Jennifer A. Yoder ◽  
Friederike Eigler ◽  
Joyce M. Mushaben ◽  
Alexandra Schwell ◽  
...  

Konrad H. Jarausch, United Germany: Debating Processes and Prospects Reviewed by Louise K. Davidson-Schmich Nick Hodgin and Caroline Pearce, ed. The GDR Remembered:Representations of the East German State since 1989 Reviewed by Jennifer A. Yoder Andrew Demshuk, The Lost German East: Forced Migration and the Politics of Memory, 1945-1970 Reviewed by Friederike Eigler Peter H. Merkl, Small Town & Village in Bavaria: The Passing of a Way of Life Reviewed by Joyce M. Mushaben Barbara Thériault, The Cop and the Sociologist. Investigating Diversity in German Police Forces Reviewed by Alexandra Schwell Clare Bielby, Violent Women in Print: Representations in the West German Print Media of the 1960s and 1970s Reviewed by Katharina Karcher Michael David-Fox, Peter Holquist, and Alexander M. Martin, ed., Fascination and Enmity: Russia and Germany as Entangled Histories, 1914-1945 Reviewed by Jennifer A. Yoder



Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document