University of Pennsylvania ScholarlyCommons Publicly Accessible Penn Dissertations 2018 Left Of Center: Displacements And Intersectionalities In Photographic Practices Of New York And Los Angeles, 1970-1988 Jeanne Dreskin University of Pennsylvania, jdreskin@sas.edu Follow this and additional works at: https://repository.edu/edissertations Part of the History of Art, Architecture, and Archaeology Commons Recommended Citation Dreskin, Jeanne, "Left Of Center: Displacements And Intersectionalities In Photographic Practices Of New York And Los Angeles, 1970-1988" (2018). Publicly Accessible Penn Dissertations.edu/edissertations/3108 This paper is posted at ScholarlyCommons.edu/edissertations/3108 For more information, please contact repository@pobox. Left Of Center: Displacements And Intersectionalities In Photographic Practices Of New York And Los Angeles, 1970-1988 Abstract Throughout the 1970s and 1980s, notions of a “postmodern image,” often revolving around the use of photography, emerged within American art world discourses. Building in significant part upon themes of postructuralist theory, art historians and critics gestured to the photograph’s inherent status as “copy,” implicating notions of authorial originality as contrived and unnatural.
My project grapples with questions as to how the scholarly contours of preeminent histories of photographic postmodernism, in their efforts to articulate photographic shifts away from late-modernist tenets, foreclosed the inclusion of artists whose work remained invested in sociopolitical concerns and imbricated politics of cultural identity introduced during the civil rights era. Three major case studies trace evolutions within the 1970s/80s photographic oeuvres of Patrick Nagatani, Lorraine O’Grady, and the collective Asco. Their work located within strategies of photographic postmodernism intersecting identity-oriented critiques of systemic race, citizenship, and class hierarchies, many of which were fomented amidst political mobilization and protest movements of the 1960s. Each artist’s use of the still camera entails a navigation of the diverse socioeconomic geographies of their urban surroundings of New York and Los Angeles.
In turn, they consider how the spaces they depict reflect their own relationships to the valuative sociocultural hierarchies structuring these major American art world centers, in which critics, curators, and scholars propped up artist communities more embedded in predominant histories. Degree Type Dissertation Degree Name Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) Graduate Group History of Art First Advisor Karen Redrobe Subject Categories History of Art, Architecture, and Archaeology This dissertation is available at ScholarlyCommons: https://repository.edu/edissertations/3108 LEFT OF CENTER: DISPLACEMENTS AND INTERSECTIONALITIES IN PHOTOGRAPHIC PRACTICES OF NEW YORK AND LOS ANGELES, 1970-1988 Jeanne M. Dreskin A DISSERTATION in History of Art Presented to the Faculties of the University of Pennsylvania in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy 2018 Supervisor of Dissertation Signature; _____________________ Karen Redrobe, Elliot and Roslyn Jaffe Endowed Professor in Film Studies Graduate Group Chairperson Signature: ______________________ Holly Pittman, Bok Family Professor in the Humanities Dissertation Committee Gwendolyn DuBois Shaw, Associate Professor of History of Art Michael Leja, James and Nan Wagner Farquhar Professor of the History of Art ACKNOWLEDGMENTS Thanks first of all to my parents and to Paul Salveson for tirelessly standing by me every step of the way throughout the development and completion of this project. Deepest, sincerest gratitude to Karen Redrobe, my dissertation advisor, as well as Gwendolyn DuBois Shaw and Michael Leja, without whose generous and discerning feedback, continual support, and keen critical eyes this project simply would not have been possible.
I’m indebted also to the wisdom and graciousness of many friends and colleagues, including Kaja Silverman, David Young Kim, Alex Klein, Philipp Kaiser, Iggy Cortez, Mashinka Firunts Hakopian, Patricia Eunji Kim, Miriam Stanton, Juliana Barton, and Rachel Wise, among others, who have all indelibly influenced my scholarship. ii ABSTRACT LEFT OF CENTER: DISPLACEMENTS AND INTERSECTIONALITIES IN PHOTOGRAPHIC PRACTICES OF NEW YORK AND LOS ANGELES, 1970-1988 Jeanne Dreskin Karen Redrobe Throughout the 1970s and 1980s, notions of a “postmodern image,” often revolving around the use of photography, emerged within American art world discourses. Building in significant part upon themes of postructuralist theory, art historians and critics gestured to the photograph’s inherent status as “copy,” implicating notions of authorial originality as contrived and unnatural. My project grapples with questions as to how the scholarly contours of preeminent histories of photographic postmodernism, in their efforts to articulate photographic shifts away from late- modernist tenets, foreclosed the inclusion of artists whose work remained invested in sociopolitical concerns and imbricated politics of cultural identity introduced during the civil rights era.
Three major case studies trace evolutions within the 1970s/80s photographic oeuvres of Patrick Nagatani, Lorraine O’Grady, and the collective Asco. Their work located within strategies of photographic postmodernism intersecting identity-oriented critiques of systemic race, citizenship, and class hierarchies, many of which were fomented amidst political mobilization and protest movements of the 1960s. Each artist’s use of the still camera entails a navigation of the diverse socioeconomic geographies of their urban surroundings of New York and Los Angeles. In turn, they consider how the spaces they depict reflect their own relationships to the valuative sociocultural hierarchies structuring these major American art world centers, in which critics, curators, and scholars propped up artist communities more embedded in predominant histories.
iii TABLE OF CONTENTS ACKNOWLEDGMENTS…………………………………………………………….iii LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS……………………………………………………….197 iv LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS (Images removed for copyright purposes) Introduction Fig. 1 Excerpt from Robert Indiana, “Back in the Frame,” T New York Times Style Magazine, February 2017 Fig. 2 Pablo Picasso, Guitare, journal, verre et bouteille, 1913, printed papers and ink on paper, 18. 3 Hannah Höch, Cut with the Kitchen Knife Dada Through the Beer-Belly of the Weimar Republic, 1919, collage of pasted papers, 44 9/10 × 35 2/5 inches (114 × 90 cm) Fig.
4 Gustav Klutsis, Let’s Fulfill the Plan of the Great Works, 1930, lithograph, 46 5/8 x 33 inches (118. 5 Barbara Kruger, (The future belongs to those who can see it), 1997, silkscreen on vinyl, 85 × 60 inches (215. 6a, 6b Covers of Robert Indiana, Scar Tissue & Other Stories; Robert Indiana, Schwarzenegger Syndrome: Politics and Celebrity in the Age of Contempt Fig. 7 T Magazine Online, Robert Indiana, “These 80s Artists are More Important Than Ever,” February 13, 2017 Fig.
8 Cindy Sherman, Untitled Film Still #15, 1978, Gelatin silver print, 9 7/16 x 7 7/16 inches (24 x 18. 9 Laurie Simmons, Woman Opening Refrigerator, 1979, Silver dye bleach print, 3 × 5 inches (7. 10 Robert Longo, Men in the Cities - Men Trapped in Ice, 1980, charcoal and graphite on paper, 60 x 40 inches (152.6 cm), each panel, Collection Mera and Donald Rebell, New York. 11 Selections from Cindy Sherman’s Bus Riders, 1976, gelatin silver prints on paper 7 ½ x 5 inches (18.
12 Martha Rosler, Detail, The Bowery in Two Inadequate Descriptive Systems, 1974-75, gelatin silver prints of text and image mounted on backing board, dimensions variable Fig. 13 Allan Sekula, detail, School is a Factory, 1978-80, gelatin silver print on paper, dimensions variable, Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofia, Madrid, Spain v Fig. 14 Fred Lonidier Detail, The Health and Safety Game, 1976/79 (Version 3), photo/text panels, dimensions variable Fig. 15 Lewis Baltz, New Industrial Parks #45, 1974, gelatin silver print, 6 in x 9 inches (15.9 cm), Museum of Contemporary Photography, San Diego Fig.
16 John Schott, Untitled (Route 66 Motels), 1973, gelatin silver print, 10 in x 8 inches (25. 17 Ansel Adams, Half Dome with Blowing Snow, ca. 1955, gelatin silver print, 14 7/8 × 18 11/16 inches, 37. 18 Ed Ruscha, Every Building on the Sunset Strip, 1966, self-published book, offset lithograph, 7 1/8 x 5 3/4 x 3/8 inches (18 x 14.95 cm), Getty Research Institute Fig.
19 Installation view, “Pictures,” 1977, Artists Space, New York Fig. 20 Cindy Sherman, Untitled Film Still #21, 1978, gelatin silver print, 7 1/2 x 9 1/2 inches (19.1 cm), Museum of Modern Art Chapter 1 Fig. 1 Asco, Decoy Gang War Victim, 1974, photograph Ó 1974, Harry Gamboa, Jr. 2 Cindy Sherman, Untitled Film Still #16, 1978, gelatin silver print, 9 7/16 x 7 9/16 inches (24 x 19.2 cm), Museum of Modern Art, New York Fig.
3 Asco, A la Mode, 1976, photograph Ó 1974, Harry Gamboa, Jr. 4 “Kick Photo,” reproduced in Stuart Hall, “The Determinations of News Photographs,” in The Manufacture of News: Social Problems, Deviance, and the Mass Media, ed. Stanley Cohen and Jock Young (London: Constable, 1981) Fig. 5 Signature by Robert Legorreta (also known as Cyclona) in Garfield High School yearbook, 1969, Harry Gamboa, Jr., Papers 1968-1995, Special Collections M0753, Stanford University Libraries, Box 12 Fig.
6 Clipping from Los Angeles Herald Examiner, March 12, 1968, Harry Gamboa, Jr., Papers 1968-1995, Special Collections M0753, Stanford University Libraries, Box 11 (Gamboa’s face circled) Fig. 7 Page 8, Chicano Student Vol. 3, May 18, 1968, Chicano Newspaper Collection, University of California, Los Angeles, Chicano Studies Research Center Fig. 8 Page 8, Chicano Student News, March 15, 1968, Harry Gamboa, Jr., Papers 1968-1995, Special Collections M0753, Stanford University Libraries, Box 11 Fig.
9 Pages 4-5, Chicano Student News, March 15, 1968, Harry Gamboa, Jr., Papers 1968-1995, Special Collections M0753, Stanford University Libraries, Box 11 vi Fig. 10 Front page, Los Angeles Herald Examiner, August 31, 1970, Los Angeles Public Library Fig. 11 Detail, Page 2, Los Angeles Herald Examiner, August 31, 1970, Los Angeles Public Library Fig. 12 Detail, Page B1, Los Angeles Times, August 30, 1970, Los Angeles Public Library Fig.
13 Detail, front page, Los Angeles Times, September 1, 1970, Los Angeles Public Library Fig. 14 Cover, La Raza Vol. 2, 1970, University of Arizona Libraries Digital Collections Fig. 15 Pages 4-5, La Raza Vol.
2, 1970, University of Arizona Libraries Digital Collections Fig. 16 Page 2, La Raza Vol. 2, 1970, University of Arizona Libraries Digital Collections Fig. 17 Detail, Page 6, La Raza Vol.
2, 1970, University of Arizona Libraries Digital Collections Fig. 18 Asco, Spraypaint LACMA, 1972, photograph Ó 1972, Harry Gamboa, Jr. 19 Eugène Atget, Rue Laplace and Rue Valette, Paris, 1926, gelatin silver print from glass negative, 8 11/16 x 6 15/16 inches (22 x 17.), The Elisha Whittelsey Collection, The Elisha Whittelsey Fund, by exchange, 1970, Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York Figs. 20a-b Asco stamp, 1974, Gronk Papers 1969-2007, CSRC.0095, University of California, Los Angeles, Chicano Studies Research Center, Box 51, Folder 2 Figs.
21a-b Mail art network mailing list, Gronk Papers 1969-2007, CSRC.0095, University of California, Los Angeles, Chicano Studies Research Center, Box 1, Folder 2 Fig. 22 Asco, The Gores, 1974, photograph Ó 1974, Harry Gamboa, Jr. 23 Asco, The Gores, 1974, photograph Ó 1974, Harry Gamboa, Jr. 24 Asco, The Gores, 1974, photograph Ó 1974, Harry Gamboa, Jr.
25 Film still, Phantom of the Paradise, 1974 Fig. 26 Film still, Phantom of the Paradise, 1974 Fig. 27 Les Petites Bonbons, 1971, photographer unknown Fig. 28 David Bowie as “The Man who Fell to Earth,” 1976, Studiocanal Films Ltd.
29 Film still, Twins of Evil, 1971 Fig. 30 Ana Mendieta, Untitled (Rape Scene), 1973, c-print, 10 × 8 inches (25.) © The Estate of Ana Mendieta Collection, LLC. 31 Front page, Los Angeles Herald Examiner, February 1, 1971, Los Angeles Public Library Fig. 32 Pages 40-41, La Raza Vol.
5, 1971, Chicano Newspaper Collection, University of California, Los Angeles, Chicano Studies Research Center Fig. 33 Detail, Page 7, La Raza Vol. 2, 1970, University of Arizona Libraries Digital Collections Fig. 34 Detail, Front page, Los Angeles Times, May 9, 1972, Los Angeles Public Library Fig.
35 Asco, Waiting for Tickets, 1975, photograph Ó 1975, Harry Gamboa, Jr. 36 Asco, Slasher No. 9, 1975, photograph Ó 1975, Harry Gamboa, Jr. 37 Front page, Los Angeles Times, February 1, 1975, Los Angeles Public Library Figs.
38a-b Details, Sarah Charlesworth, April 20, 1978, 1978, black and white print, approx.6 cm) each Fig. 39 Adrian Piper, The Mythic Being, Village Voice Ad, 1974, newspaper, 17 x 14 inches (43.), Museum of Modern Art, New York Fig. 40 Asco, Asco Goes to the Universe, 1975, photograph Ó 1975, Harry Gamboa, Jr. 1 Patrick Nagatani and Andrée Tracey, Red Piece, 1983, two Polaroid Polacolor diffusion transfer prints, 20 x 48 inches (51 x 122 cm.