New worlds/ New identities
By: Ben Greenlees
As the world becomes more and more globalized artists are able to play with the new identities of culture. New ideas about ethnics, gender, racial and national identities are always changing due to global interactions, flow of money , people and information. These things all have an effect on the way art is made as well. Art sometimes reflects the society it comes from and the political, social things happening at the time of the artists creation of the piece. Since technology is such a rising industry and the internet is creating new pathways in which people can become more connected. Two artist that are working with these ideas that I will focus on are, Kehinde Wiley, and Yinka Shonibare. As artists, both strive to push topics and ideas dealing with new identities, and showing how the we as a society are becoming more and more globalized.
Globalization has been increasingly growing in the rate in which it is inevitable given the speed in which information is past now a days. Some artists take advantage of globalization to build off one another in their artwork. This building has happened in the past like some say Picasso based some of his cubism ideas off of African masks but with the way the internet and television has hit the world ideas and topics move so fast now days. Art is become more and more hybrid. According to Noel Carroll in the chapter are we global now/yet? In the art of globalization: then and now “Furthermore, American television has been hospitable to Japanese shows, like pokemon, yu-gi-oh, hi hi puffy ami yumi sho, and the influence of japenese animation can be seen on the cartoon channels stateside. Japenese product is so familiar to Americans that a pokemon figure can be satirized in the toon Drawn Together on the cable channel comedy central. And the American company has recently launched an indigenous anime program.”(133) Americans are taking ideas and bouncing them back and forth between television cartoons and other productions of work, which in return shows that globalization is impeding at a much faster speed then before. Cartoons are not the only ones that this happens too American idol has multiple different versions for example there is an Indian idol and other American idol spin offs. Globalization has been good thing but it takes the individuality out of some things and become too bland and mixed.
One artist that plays with this idea of new identities is Kehinde Wiley, he plays with identities of people in his paintings is by placing African American urban men in poses and situations from classical paintings. Wiley’s paintings push the identities of young black urban American’s and place them in empowering stances that mimic those of classical paintings. By placing these urban African Americans dressed in street clothes he is addressing the image of the status of African American men in contemporary culture. The identities are changing in the world considering 100 years ago if you said the president would be black nobody would have ever believed you. Just by placing these African American street clothed you get a sense that things are changing little by little. The style of the painted figures is done in a traditional painting style with a background that is contemporary pattern almost fabric like for a back ground. According to his video interview that I found at the website http://current.com/items/76335342_kehinde-wiley.htm he asks men from the streets to come to his studio and pick out poses from art history books that he leaves out for them to look threw so he doesn’t even pick out the pose he allows the model to pick their favorite. He tends to lean towards painting the style of old society portraits because there is sense of power in those paintings because they were mostly wealthy white land owners. So by flipping the view to shed a different light on the subject of the giving pose of the portrait in an updated and a completely new identity, because it is one thing to see a wealthy land owner portrait but when you see a common every day guy from Brooklyn it gives off a different mood and identity. During the video some people referred to the black males in the paintings to almost be gangster like and thug like yet in the same way the pose they take places them almost away from that because of the classical way the stance of the character is taken.
Kehinde Wiley created a series where he took famous African American pop artist and put them in poses from old art historical books. In particular he painted one piece of ice cube a famous rapper in the same pose as a famous painting of napoleon seated in a thrown. Only things in the painting that are different is the character in the painting is a African American and wearing new clothing. But the symbolism of having ice cube considered one of the kings of rap plowing the way to how music is listened to today. By having him seated in a thrown like napoleon has some similarities. Both Napoleon and Ice Cube Concorde there world in a sense because Ice Cube did it with music and Napoleon did it with war. I am drawn to how realistic the painting style is and how well it is executed as far as the process and I appreciate how Wiley takes art historical references and modernizes them because I really believe the identity of people has changed why the artwork shouldn’t reflect that as well. Globalization is something that takes time but has increased in speed with the internet and fast pace lifestyles people have now a days.
The movements in painting have come a long way from classical renaissance, to modernism, and now the post modernism movement paintings have been around for ages. When most people think of art the first thing they think of is drawing and painting so by pushing the idea of globalization and new identity, painting styles have changed as well by picking up on techniques from around the world nothing is immune to globalization just some area of the world are less fortunate to globalize and acquire new information. For the most part the world painting has stayed the same but the combination of styles has changes and became more hybrid and slowly like everything else the world will become one and united. The world is slowly become a melting pot like America once was and hopefully the idea of boarders one day disappears.
Another artist that uses the idea, the way we look at the identities of raise, who pushes these thoughts further is Yinka Shonibare. He takes old pieces from art history and recreates them but threw sculpture. By using fabric associated with African outfits with vibrant colors and placing them on objects or recreated poses of art historical paintings he takes the traditional white European identities and replaces it with African associated fabric. Coincidently the fabric Dutch Wax is actually produced in Europe but it really took off in Africa. Over the years this fabric has been associated with Africa and placing this fabric over traditional European object gives the object a new identity. Considering the fabric Dutch wax in itself is fake because it is not African the designs and fabric is actually made in Europe and influenced by Indonesian design it is stereotypical of people to link that with Africa. Yinka Shonibare takes these ideas and combines them to a make a hybrid object that can be associated as African and yet at the same time European ,pushing what it really means to be African or European. In most all pieces his sculptures do not have a heads because it is more about the figure and ditch wax replacing the typical clothing and by placing a head one might associate a color or raise to the fabric when the focus of the piece is really the fabric. In one installation that Yinka Shonibare created he took a traditional Victorian house and covered all the walls and furniture with Dutch wax so it had the style of this really familiar traditional high class furnished house with this African associated fabric covering it changes the way in which we the room read. No longer is it Victorian nor is African, to me it is hybridized as globalization keeps increasing more and more cultural ideas are becoming mixed together. The idea of being fake African or even fake European isn’t so much the problem the problem comes when people have to classify art or groups of ppl as being one thing or another.
Both Kehinde Wiley and Yinka Shonibare both deal with the idea of image and how the image of people has been changing. In an interview with kehinde Wiley, Wiley said he wanted to create art that represented him because when he went to art museums he would see all these old master paintings and none of them would look like him. This idea of identity is also evident in how we associate certain fabrics and or objects with certain groups of people. Switches the way in which people should go about stereotyping object or people. By pushing people to broaden the ways in which they look at objects and view the world helps globalization move faster. Opening up new ideas and combining identities in society carries over into artwork as well, artwork that might be created today has an effect on future because like most things artwork is becoming more globalized and helping society branch out into new identities.
The world is moving and we are constantly changing and combining and hybridizing the way things are done. Globalization brings everyone closer together and helps mankind move and better ourselves because being able to work together and creates a new identity one that is hopefully a positive one in the future. As long as people become more and more connected via internet or other forms of communication, globalization and the formation of new identities will only increase and artist are playing a vitally role in the way that is being seen as well.
By: Ben Greenlees
As the world becomes more and more globalized artists are able to play with the new identities of culture. New ideas about ethnics, gender, racial and national identities are always changing due to global interactions, flow of money , people and information. These things all have an effect on the way art is made as well. Art sometimes reflects the society it comes from and the political, social things happening at the time of the artists creation of the piece. Since technology is such a rising industry and the internet is creating new pathways in which people can become more connected. Two artist that are working with these ideas that I will focus on are, Kehinde Wiley, and Yinka Shonibare. As artists, both strive to push topics and ideas dealing with new identities, and showing how the we as a society are becoming more and more globalized.
Globalization has been increasingly growing in the rate in which it is inevitable given the speed in which information is past now a days. Some artists take advantage of globalization to build off one another in their artwork. This building has happened in the past like some say Picasso based some of his cubism ideas off of African masks but with the way the internet and television has hit the world ideas and topics move so fast now days. Art is become more and more hybrid. According to Noel Carroll in the chapter are we global now/yet? In the art of globalization: then and now “Furthermore, American television has been hospitable to Japanese shows, like pokemon, yu-gi-oh, hi hi puffy ami yumi sho, and the influence of japenese animation can be seen on the cartoon channels stateside. Japenese product is so familiar to Americans that a pokemon figure can be satirized in the toon Drawn Together on the cable channel comedy central. And the American company has recently launched an indigenous anime program.”(133) Americans are taking ideas and bouncing them back and forth between television cartoons and other productions of work, which in return shows that globalization is impeding at a much faster speed then before. Cartoons are not the only ones that this happens too American idol has multiple different versions for example there is an Indian idol and other American idol spin offs. Globalization has been good thing but it takes the individuality out of some things and become too bland and mixed.
One artist that plays with this idea of new identities is Kehinde Wiley, he plays with identities of people in his paintings is by placing African American urban men in poses and situations from classical paintings. Wiley’s paintings push the identities of young black urban American’s and place them in empowering stances that mimic those of classical paintings. By placing these urban African Americans dressed in street clothes he is addressing the image of the status of African American men in contemporary culture. The identities are changing in the world considering 100 years ago if you said the president would be black nobody would have ever believed you. Just by placing these African American street clothed you get a sense that things are changing little by little. The style of the painted figures is done in a traditional painting style with a background that is contemporary pattern almost fabric like for a back ground. According to his video interview that I found at the website http://current.com/items/76335342_kehinde-wiley.htm he asks men from the streets to come to his studio and pick out poses from art history books that he leaves out for them to look threw so he doesn’t even pick out the pose he allows the model to pick their favorite. He tends to lean towards painting the style of old society portraits because there is sense of power in those paintings because they were mostly wealthy white land owners. So by flipping the view to shed a different light on the subject of the giving pose of the portrait in an updated and a completely new identity, because it is one thing to see a wealthy land owner portrait but when you see a common every day guy from Brooklyn it gives off a different mood and identity. During the video some people referred to the black males in the paintings to almost be gangster like and thug like yet in the same way the pose they take places them almost away from that because of the classical way the stance of the character is taken.
Kehinde Wiley created a series where he took famous African American pop artist and put them in poses from old art historical books. In particular he painted one piece of ice cube a famous rapper in the same pose as a famous painting of napoleon seated in a thrown. Only things in the painting that are different is the character in the painting is a African American and wearing new clothing. But the symbolism of having ice cube considered one of the kings of rap plowing the way to how music is listened to today. By having him seated in a thrown like napoleon has some similarities. Both Napoleon and Ice Cube Concorde there world in a sense because Ice Cube did it with music and Napoleon did it with war. I am drawn to how realistic the painting style is and how well it is executed as far as the process and I appreciate how Wiley takes art historical references and modernizes them because I really believe the identity of people has changed why the artwork shouldn’t reflect that as well. Globalization is something that takes time but has increased in speed with the internet and fast pace lifestyles people have now a days.
The movements in painting have come a long way from classical renaissance, to modernism, and now the post modernism movement paintings have been around for ages. When most people think of art the first thing they think of is drawing and painting so by pushing the idea of globalization and new identity, painting styles have changed as well by picking up on techniques from around the world nothing is immune to globalization just some area of the world are less fortunate to globalize and acquire new information. For the most part the world painting has stayed the same but the combination of styles has changes and became more hybrid and slowly like everything else the world will become one and united. The world is slowly become a melting pot like America once was and hopefully the idea of boarders one day disappears.
Another artist that uses the idea, the way we look at the identities of raise, who pushes these thoughts further is Yinka Shonibare. He takes old pieces from art history and recreates them but threw sculpture. By using fabric associated with African outfits with vibrant colors and placing them on objects or recreated poses of art historical paintings he takes the traditional white European identities and replaces it with African associated fabric. Coincidently the fabric Dutch Wax is actually produced in Europe but it really took off in Africa. Over the years this fabric has been associated with Africa and placing this fabric over traditional European object gives the object a new identity. Considering the fabric Dutch wax in itself is fake because it is not African the designs and fabric is actually made in Europe and influenced by Indonesian design it is stereotypical of people to link that with Africa. Yinka Shonibare takes these ideas and combines them to a make a hybrid object that can be associated as African and yet at the same time European ,pushing what it really means to be African or European. In most all pieces his sculptures do not have a heads because it is more about the figure and ditch wax replacing the typical clothing and by placing a head one might associate a color or raise to the fabric when the focus of the piece is really the fabric. In one installation that Yinka Shonibare created he took a traditional Victorian house and covered all the walls and furniture with Dutch wax so it had the style of this really familiar traditional high class furnished house with this African associated fabric covering it changes the way in which we the room read. No longer is it Victorian nor is African, to me it is hybridized as globalization keeps increasing more and more cultural ideas are becoming mixed together. The idea of being fake African or even fake European isn’t so much the problem the problem comes when people have to classify art or groups of ppl as being one thing or another.
Both Kehinde Wiley and Yinka Shonibare both deal with the idea of image and how the image of people has been changing. In an interview with kehinde Wiley, Wiley said he wanted to create art that represented him because when he went to art museums he would see all these old master paintings and none of them would look like him. This idea of identity is also evident in how we associate certain fabrics and or objects with certain groups of people. Switches the way in which people should go about stereotyping object or people. By pushing people to broaden the ways in which they look at objects and view the world helps globalization move faster. Opening up new ideas and combining identities in society carries over into artwork as well, artwork that might be created today has an effect on future because like most things artwork is becoming more globalized and helping society branch out into new identities.
The world is moving and we are constantly changing and combining and hybridizing the way things are done. Globalization brings everyone closer together and helps mankind move and better ourselves because being able to work together and creates a new identity one that is hopefully a positive one in the future. As long as people become more and more connected via internet or other forms of communication, globalization and the formation of new identities will only increase and artist are playing a vitally role in the way that is being seen as well.
