🌈Queer Art History Unit 4 – Postmodern & Contemporary Queer Art

Key Concepts and Themes

• Explores non-normative gender identities and sexual orientations through art
• Challenges traditional notions of beauty, desire, and the body
• Subverts heteronormative narratives and representation in art history
• Addresses intersectionality, highlighting the experiences of queer people of color, queer women, and transgender individuals
• Employs strategies of appropriation, pastiche, and irony to critique dominant cultural norms
  • Appropriation involves borrowing or copying elements from existing artworks or cultural artifacts to create new meanings
  • Pastiche combines elements from different sources to create a new work that often has a satirical or critical edge
• Engages with themes of activism, resistance, and social justice
• Investigates the relationship between personal identity and broader political struggles

Historical Context

• Emerged in the late 20th century, building on the foundations of the LGBT rights movement and the AIDS crisis
• Influenced by postmodern theories that challenged grand narratives and binary thinking
• Coincided with the rise of queer theory in academia, which sought to deconstruct categories of gender and sexuality
• Responded to the exclusion and marginalization of queer artists in mainstream art institutions
• Developed in parallel with other identity-based art movements, such as feminist art and African American art
• Gained visibility through exhibitions like "Extended Sensibilities: Homosexual Presence in Contemporary Art" (1982) at the New Museum in New York
• Benefited from the increasing acceptance of LGBT rights in Western societies, while also facing backlash and censorship

Influential Artists and Movements

• David Wojnarowicz: Known for his provocative multimedia works that addressed the AIDS crisis and government inaction
• Nan Goldin: Photographed intimate portraits of the queer community, capturing the raw emotions and experiences of her subjects
• Felix Gonzalez-Torres: Created minimalist installations that evoked themes of love, loss, and identity in the context of the AIDS epidemic
  • His "Untitled" (Portrait of Ross in L.A.) (1991) consisted of a pile of candy weighing the same as his partner Ross, who died of AIDS
• Catherine Opie: Photographed portraits of the queer community, often focusing on butch lesbians and transgender individuals
• Gran Fury: An artist collective that created provocative public art campaigns to raise awareness about AIDS and critique government inaction
• Queer Nation: An activist group that used art and media to challenge homophobia and advocate for LGBT rights
• Dyke Action Machine!: A lesbian artist collective that created satirical advertisements to subvert heteronormative media representations

Techniques and Media

• Appropriation of mass media images and popular culture to subvert dominant narratives
• Use of photography to document queer lives and communities, often in a raw and intimate style
• Performance art that explores gender identity, sexuality, and the body
  • Examples include works by Ron Athey, who used his own body to challenge taboos around sexuality and illness
• Installation art that creates immersive environments to engage viewers in themes of desire, loss, and memory
• Video art that employs non-linear narratives and experimental techniques to explore queer subjectivities
• Collage and montage that juxtapose disparate images to create new meanings and associations
• Text-based works that incorporate language from queer theory, activism, and personal experiences

Representation and Identity

• Challenges the lack of representation and visibility of queer people in art history and contemporary art
• Asserts the validity and value of queer lives and experiences
• Explores the diversity and complexity of queer identities, rejecting essentialist notions of gender and sexuality
• Investigates the intersection of queerness with other marginalized identities, such as race, class, and disability
  • Artists like Glenn Ligon and Lyle Ashton Harris address the experiences of queer people of color
  • Artists like Laura Aguilar and Chitra Ganesh explore the intersection of queerness and disability
• Challenges the male gaze and heteronormative notions of desire in art
• Reclaims and reinterprets historical figures and cultural icons from a queer perspective
  • Examples include works by Deborah Kass that appropriate and subvert the imagery of male modernist artists like Andy Warhol

Critical Theory and Analysis

• Draws on queer theory, which emerged in the 1990s to challenge binary notions of gender and sexuality
  • Key thinkers include Judith Butler, Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick, and José Esteban Muñoz
• Employs poststructuralist theories to deconstruct categories of identity and desire
• Engages with feminist theory to analyze the intersection of gender and sexuality
• Utilizes psychoanalytic concepts to explore the unconscious desires and fantasies that shape queer subjectivities
• Draws on critical race theory to investigate the experiences of queer people of color
• Applies Marxist analysis to examine the relationship between sexuality, class, and capitalism
• Incorporates postcolonial theory to critique the Western bias of queer theory and art history

Impact on Society and Culture

• Contributed to the increasing visibility and acceptance of LGBT people in mainstream society
• Challenged the censorship and regulation of queer art by government agencies and conservative groups
  • Examples include the controversies surrounding Robert Mapplethorpe's photographs and David Wojnarowicz's "A Fire in My Belly" (1986-87)
• Inspired a new generation of queer artists and activists
• Influenced popular culture, including fashion, music, and film
• Helped to establish queer studies as an academic discipline
• Contributed to the development of queer-friendly spaces and institutions, such as LGBT community centers and art galleries
• Raised awareness about the ongoing struggles for LGBT rights and social justice

Contemporary Developments

• Increasing recognition of queer art in mainstream museums and galleries
  • Examples include the "Hide/Seek" exhibition at the Smithsonian Institution in 2010 and the "Art AIDS America" exhibition in 2015
• Growing interest in the work of transgender and non-binary artists, such as Juliana Huxtable and Tourmaline
• Emergence of new digital media platforms for queer art and activism, such as social media and online exhibitions
• Continued engagement with intersectional issues, such as the Black Lives Matter movement and the global refugee crisis
• Exploration of queer ecology and the relationship between sexuality, nature, and the environment
• Increased attention to the experiences of queer people in non-Western cultures and the Global South
• Ongoing debates about the mainstreaming and commercialization of queer art and culture
• Renewed focus on the importance of community-based art practices and grassroots activism in the face of political backlash and rising conservatism