[Blake_Stimson,_Gregory_Sholette]_Collectivism_aft(z-lib
Internationaleries 25and an active rethinking about the relationship of man-made objects withnature. Bachelard’s work on imagination, in addition to Lefebvre’s criticalwritings on space, provided CoBrA’s experimental starting point and providedthe group with a highly speciWc tool useful against all sorts of idealizations,generalizations, and ideological recuperation.The CoBrA IAE experimentation also included an active, collectiveconcern with the education of artists. For example, they proposedthat art was a total, collective act and art pedagogy was an exchange amongequals rather than a dynamic based on hierarchies of power. Another intrinsicand crucial part of their activity was publishing. Much of this took placein the “Cobra House” located in an abandoned house in the Atelier duMarais in Brussels where the group’s printing press was located. It was herethe members collaborated on a variety of experimental publishing projectsincluding their journal Cobra: An Organ of the International of ExperimentalArtists as well as Le Petit Cobra, a more spontaneous publication that servedto record the collective’s key events, dates, and so forth. There was in additiona third organ called Le Tout Petit Cobra used to swiftly summarize groupactivities. Given the difWcult economic circumstances in Europe during thelate 1940s these publications were among their most important achievements.Considered together, the three collaborative journals, the group’sresearch on existing and extinct folk traditions, their organization of numerousfestivals and exhibitions, and the series of printed monographs knownas the Cobra Encyclopaedie continue to demonstrate the signiWcance ofCoBrA IAE for the study and elaboration of visual culture and art history.The 1950s were a particularly tense moment in the cold war. Itwas also at this juncture that the book Kalte Kunst, or “Cold Art,” by KarlGerstner, was published. Its title almost served as a homogenizing metaphorfor the dominant functionalist rhetoric of the times. 39 Without any irony theauthor advocated a speciWc form of geometric, highly rationalized, and monolithicart making based on avant-garde constructivist-like forms, mathematicalformula, and arithmetical color progressions as the progressive artisticform of the twentieth century. Yet the inconsistencies inherent in the functionalistapproach so forcefully critiqued by the internationaleries are actuallymade apparent as the author rejects the role of the imagination preferringinstead a modular regulation of artistic form. Nevertheless, the rhetoric ofKalte Kunst proved extremely popular among artists especially those in theSoviet Union, Eastern Europe, and Latin America with some of these ideasreXected in the large number of groups who shared a similar belief in thecreation of systemic art including kinetic, op, or minimal art, and visual orconcrete poetry. Often these artists couched their aesthetic ideology, as wellas their obvious gloriWcation of functionalism, in an outspoken desire to
FIGURE 1.3. Back cover of Cobra, no. 10 (Fall 1951). Collection Stedelijk Museum Schiedam,The Netherlands. Photograph by Bob Goedewaagen, Rotterdam. A coiled cobra, a mystical beast anda prominent symbol in many ancient genesis myths, was the group’s trademark. Homogenizing thegroup’s acronym into one signiWer clearly encapsulates their rhetoric of a third force and a desire tosituate their international collective experimentation outside the dominant cold war discursive modesbased on modernization and progress.
- Page 2 and 3: ▲COLLECTIVISMAFTERMODERNISM
- Page 4 and 5: COLLECTIVISM▲AFTERMODERNISMThe Ar
- Page 6 and 7: TO LOUISE AND ARIANA
- Page 8 and 9: CONTENTS6. The Mexican Pentagon 165
- Page 10 and 11: AcknowledgmentsThis book would not
- Page 12 and 13: PrefaceThe collectivization of arti
- Page 14 and 15: FIGURE P.1. Promotional poster for
- Page 16 and 17: Prefacexvdirectly opposite individu
- Page 18 and 19: Prefacexviiadmit a desire to see al
- Page 20 and 21: Introduction: Periodizing Collectiv
- Page 22 and 23: Introduction 3to increase their pro
- Page 24 and 25: Introduction 5Modernist artists und
- Page 26 and 27: Introduction 7Those good intentions
- Page 28 and 29: Introduction 9and that helped give
- Page 30 and 31: Introduction 11collectivism brings
- Page 32 and 33: Introduction 13artists on Chicago
- Page 34 and 35: Introduction 15Phase of the Cultura
- Page 36 and 37: 1. Internationaleries: Collectivism
- Page 38 and 39: Internationaleries 19played a “us
- Page 40 and 41: Internationaleries 21Rooskens, Euge
- Page 42 and 43: FIGURE 1.2. Le “Realisme-Socialis
- Page 46 and 47: Internationaleries 27create a democ
- Page 48 and 49: Internationaleries 29of the fourth
- Page 50 and 51: Internationaleries 31Debord’s 196
- Page 52 and 53: Internationaleries 33in which the n
- Page 54 and 55: Internationaleries 35be demystiWed
- Page 56 and 57: Internationaleries 37printing a ser
- Page 58 and 59: Internationaleries 39NOTES1. Harold
- Page 60 and 61: Internationaleries 4136. The exhibi
- Page 62 and 63: Internationaleries 4377. Michel de
- Page 64 and 65: 2. After the “Descent to the Ever
- Page 66 and 67: After the “Descent to the Everyda
- Page 68 and 69: After the “Descent to the Everyda
- Page 70 and 71: After the “Descent to the Everyda
- Page 72 and 73: After the “Descent to the Everyda
- Page 74 and 75: After the “Descent to the Everyda
- Page 76 and 77: After the “Descent to the Everyda
- Page 78 and 79: After the “Descent to the Everyda
- Page 80 and 81: After the “Descent to the Everyda
- Page 82 and 83: After the “Descent to the Everyda
- Page 84 and 85: After the “Descent to the Everyda
- Page 86 and 87: After the “Descent to the Everyda
- Page 88 and 89: After the “Descent to the Everyda
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Internationaleries 25
and an active rethinking about the relationship of man-made objects with
nature. Bachelard’s work on imagination, in addition to Lefebvre’s critical
writings on space, provided CoBrA’s experimental starting point and provided
the group with a highly speciWc tool useful against all sorts of idealizations,
generalizations, and ideological recuperation.
The CoBrA IAE experimentation also included an active, collective
concern with the education of artists. For example, they proposed
that art was a total, collective act and art pedagogy was an exchange among
equals rather than a dynamic based on hierarchies of power. Another intrinsic
and crucial part of their activity was publishing. Much of this took place
in the “Cobra House” located in an abandoned house in the Atelier du
Marais in Brussels where the group’s printing press was located. It was here
the members collaborated on a variety of experimental publishing projects
including their journal Cobra: An Organ of the International of Experimental
Artists as well as Le Petit Cobra, a more spontaneous publication that served
to record the collective’s key events, dates, and so forth. There was in addition
a third organ called Le Tout Petit Cobra used to swiftly summarize group
activities. Given the difWcult economic circumstances in Europe during the
late 1940s these publications were among their most important achievements.
Considered together, the three collaborative journals, the group’s
research on existing and extinct folk traditions, their organization of numerous
festivals and exhibitions, and the series of printed monographs known
as the Cobra Encyclopaedie continue to demonstrate the signiWcance of
CoBrA IAE for the study and elaboration of visual culture and art history.
The 1950s were a particularly tense moment in the cold war. It
was also at this juncture that the book Kalte Kunst, or “Cold Art,” by Karl
Gerstner, was published. Its title almost served as a homogenizing metaphor
for the dominant functionalist rhetoric of the times. 39 Without any irony the
author advocated a speciWc form of geometric, highly rationalized, and monolithic
art making based on avant-garde constructivist-like forms, mathematical
formula, and arithmetical color progressions as the progressive artistic
form of the twentieth century. Yet the inconsistencies inherent in the functionalist
approach so forcefully critiqued by the internationaleries are actually
made apparent as the author rejects the role of the imagination preferring
instead a modular regulation of artistic form. Nevertheless, the rhetoric of
Kalte Kunst proved extremely popular among artists especially those in the
Soviet Union, Eastern Europe, and Latin America with some of these ideas
reXected in the large number of groups who shared a similar belief in the
creation of systemic art including kinetic, op, or minimal art, and visual or
concrete poetry. Often these artists couched their aesthetic ideology, as well
as their obvious gloriWcation of functionalism, in an outspoken desire to