The political movements of the 1960s—the Civil Rights movement, the anti-Vietnam War campaign, and the feminist movement—had transformed cultural life in the United States. As political elites continued to make decisions that enmeshed the US ever more deeply in war and inequality, art became more provocative and a vehicle of sociopolitical change. New York City provides the setting for Patti Smith’s memoir, Just Kids, at a time when NYC had become a haven for struggling artists to immerse themselves in their craft as well as to gain inspiration from other artists who had already achieved a privileged position in the arts. For Patti Smith, the daunting decision to move to New York at 19 years old led her to experiments with identity, her explorations …show more content…
Patti Smith's memoir tells the tale of her artistic ambitions and her relationship with Robert Mapplethorpe. She depicts their uphill battle to find recognition for their art and to reinterpret love for herself. The 1960s in America was a decade consisting of compelling social change with notable social movements and events creating the country’s cultural landscape. What triggered the uproar of social movements occurred before the 1960s with the Civil Rights movement. A prominent issue that occurred in the Southern United States was segregation between African Americans and other Americans (predominantly White Americans). Segregation was implanted in all aspects of American society that eventually became “an accepted part of southern society” (Greene 2010). The government’s perspective on civil rights was stagnant and not striving toward …show more content…
The city that gradually welcomed young artists eventually created a close-knit environment where everyone was seeking to get their work out of the door and into the hands of success. However, these ventures artists took were set when the landscape of New York City was deteriorating out of the social division. The “postwar optimism” the country continued to pursue impacted New York City through the deindustrialization of downtown neighborhoods, rise in crime, and poverty (Rohlwing 2018). With this backdrop behind many young artists seeking to move to New York City, it further enhanced the escapism towards their craft. The diverse and accepting art community of New York City eventually inspired a new and upcoming artist by the name of Patti
In this extremely controversial work, Glenn C. Altschuler takes aim on the government’s accusations, the prejudice from the police, and the affect that rock ’n’ roll made in America through the late forties and fifties. Glenn makes many accusations of his own through the way he shifts the momentum of the story from time to time. Through the years back then and now, music has caused many racial and gender controversies. In this book, Glenn explains all these problems and what rock did to start or get of them.
Although for Nevelson, wood and black don’t have a particular symbolism to her work, but rather serves as the tools of attaining an essence, one can observe some direct references to the differences shared by the feminine and masculine social expectations and associations within her work. New York City did not just gave Louise Nevelson the opportunity to inspire from the Abstract Expressionist that was a “cross-fertilization had been essential to her development as an artist”, but also the architecture of the city as a source of inspiration. (Lisle, 129). Nevelson always mentioned the impact of New York City as a megapolis on her large scale works made in the late 1950’s and early 1960’s. For instance, Nevelson explains how the city’s artistic and urban transformation aided her style to develop into a
From the psychedelic music of the Grateful Dead and the rise of the feminist movement, to sex trafficking rings and babies tripping on acid, the 1960s were a time of dramatic change and social unrest. Slouching Towards Bethlehem, Joan Didion's collection of personal essays published in 1968, investigates the multifaceted cultural landscape of the 1960s. The collection of essays is primarily set in California and serves as the focal point for the critique and analysis of the broader social and political shifts taking place in the United States. Didion provides a viewpoint that conveys the realities and complexities that have shaped society. From the 1960s until the mid-1970s, the counterculture movement saw an upheaval in identity, family dynamics,
“The most oppressive feature of black secondary education was that southern local and state governments, through maintaining and expanding the benefits of public secondary education for white children, refused to provide public high school facilities for black children.” In sum, Anderson uses this chapter to build a broader argument about the “separate, but equal doctrine” under Plessy v. Ferguson that mandated segregation. More specifically, he situates this argument through case studies in Lynchburg, VA and Little Rock, AR. In the culminating chapter, James Anderson discusses the emergence of historically black universities and black land-grant colleges.
In Living for the City, Donna Murch argues that the Black Panther Party started with a study group in Oakland, California. She explains how a small city with a recent history of African American settlement produced such compelling and influential forms of Black Power politics. During the time of historical and political struggle in California 's system of public college, black southern traveling workers formed the BPP. In “Jim Crow’s Counterculture”, Lawson argues that the Great Migration and World War II changed the blues music from the thinking and behavior of younger people who want to be different from the rest of society to one that celebrated the work attitude and the war effort as ways to claim “American citizenship”.
Memories are windows into the past. They allow us to relive our greatest victories, and remember our worst defeats. In her memoir M Train, author Patti Smith explores the theme of memories in great detail. She provides us with a collection of her own experiences, which outline important moments throughout her life. In doing so, Smith challenges the memoir “status quo,” by opting to employ a unique narrative structure that reflects the theme of its contents.
Works of art and literature are never created to only be looked upon by the artist; they are created to propose a plan, or change an opinion, or make a difference. Both in Joan Didion’s essay “Rock of Ages” and Dave Barry’s newspaper column, “Dating Made Easy”, they each use various devices to achieve a specific goal. When Didion first arrives at Alcatraz she lists all the flowers that she sees. She then specifically informs the reader that “candytuft springs … exercise yard”(Didion 205). Didion gives the reader extremely specific details, after having described a broader scene.
The 1950’s and 60’s were the beginning of the civil rights movement. Malvina Reynolds song “Little Boxes” is a critique of the culture of conformity during
Andy Warhol is a renowned artist whose work has become synonymous with the Pop Art movement. While he is celebrated for his artistic contributions, Warhol's mistreatment of BIPOC queer communities has been the subject of criticism. This essay will examine the ways in which Warhol exploited these communities for his own gain and contributed to their marginalization. Warhol's interactions with BIPOC queer communities can be traced back to the 1960s, when he became involved with the Factory, a collective of artists, musicians, and performers. The Factory was a haven for those who did not fit into mainstream society, including BIPOC queer individuals.
Landau aims to discuss how American society used Pollock, Brando and Dean as a counter culture to their already growing bureaucratic and deeply homogenised society, praising them as “rebel heroes” who spoke through action rather than words, redefining the meaning of an “American Hero” and also leading to Abstract Expressionism becoming an artistic manifestation to an emerging subculture called the “Beat Generation”. Landau is
Music is like a weapon, it can carry a powerful message attached with unexplainable tones and themes. To some people, it’s a way of coping, to others it’s a form of entertainment. In 1954, the Civil Rights Movement took place. This movement was a struggle for justice and equality
The slow tap-tap, tap-tap that synchronized the Fifth Avenue March steadied Alice Mansfield “like a rope cast for rescue” (58), a safe sound to shield her from what jazz music’s rapid, shifting, brassy melodies make her aware of: everything she’s repressed. A widely noted aspect of jazz music is the way it articulates traditionally shameful parts of human nature, such as violence and sexuality – which makes Alice squirm. But this popular conception of jazz misconstrues the genre by leaving out its racial historical context, one of its crucial themes. In the Fifth Avenue scene, Morrison describes how jazz illuminates another source of pain and discomfort that Alice – and all of American culture – has a tendency to repress: knowledge of racism of the past and
The 1960’s was truly an age of reform and revolution that set the stage for Susan Sontag 's, “Notes on ‘Camp,’” published in 1964. The decade saw the emergence of large scale political campaigns aiming to increase opportunities for all people, such as the Civil Rights movement. Some reformers demanded social change and denounced capitalism in order to create a counterculture encouraging self-exploration and fulfillment, often involving sex positivity, drug use and communal living. To counter some of these liberal movements the modern conservative movement was born with the ideals later reflected in the Reagan era. Additionally, 1960’s America saw a the development of several new forms of art such as Op art (or Optical art), Pop art, Performance
The years leading up to Judy Chicago’s first series The Rejection Quintet in 1974 saw a great amount of effort in finding her true identity as a female artist during a time which men made up the majority of the art scene. During the 1971 Rap Weekend in Fresno, Chicago, together with Miriam Schapiro, showcased works that used the central format of abstracted flowers or folds of the vagina. Chicago later reflected on the showcase stating that she could not express her own feelings as she met other women who were just as oppressed as she was through the struggles of being a female artist. The first piece of The Rejection Quintet, How Does It Feel to Be Rejected?, marks the acceptance of the struggles Chicago went through and her symbolic transition into what became her most iconic installation The Dinner Party. This paper will discuss the significance of Chicago’s, How Does It Feel to Be Rejected?, as it proved to be the first small step for her towards revealing the “central-core” for which she labels as her feminine imagery.
During this time, the nation experienced a public examination of its most adverse flaws, with the establishment of an ideal society perceived as the end result. This societal shift was most vividly reflected by Allen Ginsberg, with his notorious poem “Howl”, which was a cry of desperation against the heavy-handed conformism of the era and an affirmation of the glory of the human experience. Ginsberg begins his poem by writing, “I saw the best minds of my generation destroyed by madness” (Ginsberg), capturing the essence of what incited the Beat Movement, where the “best minds” referred to those figures whose unwillingness to conform had ostracized them from society. In order to adhere to this conviction, Beat writers commonly refused to promote inhibition and censoring of self expression in their work. With this in mind, Jack Kerouac, another leading figure of the Beat Movement, declared that one should “believe in the holy contour of life… [and have] no fear or shame in the dignity of [their] experience, language & knowledge” (You’re A Genius All The Time).