Getty Group (Dominique G., Brett M., Shixiang H., Trevor L., Allie L., and Danh C.)
Also, our new band photo
The first day of my two-day trip to Los Angeles with fellow Sac State students was spent at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art. As nice of an experience as that was, it lacked in much contemporary work. Our second day was spent at The Getty, which had an exhibit on contemporary work titled Breaking News: Turning the Lens on Mass Media.
The exhibit, which runs from December 20th, 2016 to April 30th, 2017, shows how various artists used the news media as source material for their photos and videos, over the last fifty years. Most of the work is a response to how the media covered the Vietnam War (1955-75), and George W. Bush's declared "War on Terror," post the 9/11 attacks. Part of the exhibit's statement reads:
"Artists began to question both the authority of the news media and the veracity of its images, employing strategies of mimicry and appropriation to highlight and challenge the glut of visual information. They were concerned as well with the instability of a photograph's meaning and the different ways in which news is mediated, manipulated, and interpreted according to the surrounding context."
Sarah Charlesworth, Osservatore Romano, March 17-May10, 1978, electrophotographic prints
From the series Modern History
The show exhibits over two-hundred pieces from seventeen different artists. The first one I was drawn to is the conceptual work of artist Sarah Charlesworth. Charlesworth would reproduce the front page of a newspaper, erase the print with the exception of the masthead, then trim the print to the size of the original newspaper. This series of work is titled Modern History. Within this series, Osservatore Romano, the name of a piece as well as the name of the Vatican City State's newspaper, is an image-only documentation of the abduction and assassination of former Italian Prime Minister Aldo Moro by a terrorist organization. The layout reveals editorial decisions and the importance of image placement.
Sarah Charlesworth, Osservatore Romano, March 17-May10, 1978, electrophotographic prints
From the series Modern History
Martha Rosler, First Lady (Pat Nixon), 1967-72, printed 2011, inkjet print
From the series House Beautiful: Bringing the War Home
My favorite work in the exhibit is Martha Rosler's House Beautiful: Bringing the War Home series. Rosler would take magazine issues of Life and superimpose croppings of Vietnamese citizens maimed in war on idealized, domestic interiors. I can imagine almost missing these juxtapositions, if this work was featured in a magazine. But once noticed, they're striking, especially when one considers that the images come from the same source.
Martha Rosler, Giacometti, 1967-72, printed 2011, inkjet print
From the series House Beautiful: Bringing the War Home
The work is a sobering reminder of the "Us Versus Them" mentality of war. We tend to forget that we are part of a system that is destructive of others when we're so steeped in our embrace of capitalist, commodity culture. Through the House Beautiful series, the viewer is pushed into reconsidering their "here" and "there" worldview when images of the horrors of war are brought literally right into the affluent, American living room.
Me by Alfredo Jaar's Searching for Africa in LIFE
Photo by Allie Lown
It's important to have a news media with a free press. But it's more important to know how that media can shape a story and present it so it's perceived in a particular manner. The artists behind the works in the Breaking News are clearly aware of that and their work encourages the viewer to develop the same critical understanding of the process. I'm really pleased to have been able to see this exhibit. And I'm happy that my first time at The Getty was with friends who share the same enthusiasm for experiencing art. The weather was also unbelievably nice.
Trevor L., Allie L., Shixiang H., Dominique G., and Danh C.
(We lost Brett)
