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The
demise of liberalism as the dominant ideology of mainstream American
politics has passed by unnoticed for most Americans because it
survives so well in memory and in our self-view. Living on in
small aspects of our daily lives, it parades conveniently under
the guise of "political correctness." In general terms,
we still like to think of America as a bastion of freedom and
repository of social good will, when, in fact, one step outside
the country reveals our nature as imperialist, self serving, archly
conservative and ignorant, and disdainful of the rest of the world.
The term "global economies" is a code for plunder.
Artists are not immune to this overall amnesia.
Sometimes they are so self absorbed, they manage to espouse casual
left wing attitudes while remaining couch potatoes down deep.
They are consumers of media and spectacle like everyone else and
their product, ironically, is the stuff of commodity as trend
oriented as any fashion show.
Jane Irish's investigations into her own political
belief system and artmaking serve as an indictment of this particular
American disease, an apathy which has become so profound as to
now be the cause of overtly catastrophic events. Call it passive/aggressiveness
on a global scale. Although not an activist herself, Irish attempts
to underline the widespread ambivalence of the American public
by illustrating her own history and digging up some moments in
art history featuring concerned artists of different periods.
Looking back on her own formative years, she updates her preoccupation
with upper class Robber Baron decoration and combines it with
ephemera from a nearly forgotten period of protest in the 1960s
and early 70s. Thrown into this are homages to politically motivated
conceptual artists of the same volatile period. The corollary
between early conceptual art and political thinking are worth
noting. Perhaps the lesson here is that if you don't study the
past, it will repeat itself. This view, Irish promotes on several
levels.
The large painted piece in the show forms a
vertical triptych of horizontal panels and successfully plays
off a contradiction of political message with the decorative style
of the painting -- a well-studied blend of storybook illustration
and honest-to-goodness craft emulating Boucher. The title describes
it well: Resistance, Wealth, and Heroic Protest. The trompe d'oeil
allows references of high and low culture from different ages
to mingle. A small depiction of Richard M. Nixon in this art context
subtly conveys the political polarity of the time that infused
all areas of culture and divided generations. You may not have
been able to tell the boys from the girls, but you could tell
counter-culture from establishment, or so goes the myth. Where
has this polarity gone? Although Irish does not give away her
whole perspective on these complex historical relationships, there
is a sense of her own sadness at the loss of investment in our
country and some guilt by association to her own generation. Perhaps,
there is also a sense of pride in resurrecting these issues after
they have long since been relegated to the nostalgia bin by media.
Political beliefs are now accessories like handbags.
It is dangerous for an artist to closely compare
their work with others. But Irish juxtaposes her work directly
with paintings in PAFA's collection. The formal comparison brings
up differences in craft, quality, and intention, and comments
on the nature the Academy's present and historic position in the
art world. Never at the cutting edge of Modernist art, these pictures
by Reginald Marsh, Walter Gay, Alfred Bendiner, and others offer
a redeeming quality in this context. It is a difficult homage
to pull off because, although these pictures share an affinity
with Irish's own political stance, they remain period works tied
to the constraints of their time.
At the other end of the spectrum, Irish picks
up on several moments in the history of conceptual art that illustrate
class concerns. Here the result is more assured. Set in the form
of frieze-like cast reliefs, much like those on the building itself,
are moments commemorating the work of Vito Acconci, Terry Fox,
Adrian Piper, and Marcel Broodthaers. The inclusion of these make
a point about art mixing theory and actions. Oddly enough, presented
like this, the homage to conceptual work seems to connect with
the social realism of the Academy painting, especially After Terry
Fox, which illustrates a performance piece from 1970. In the original
piece, Cellar, Terry Fox arranged for a derelict to live in the
basement of the Reese-Palley gallery in New York. Those were the
days. Exhibiting these gestures of healthy liberalism and activism
from the oddly similar periods seem to prove that politics and
art were never mutually exclusive. Perhaps, only recently has
the thread been lost, become unfashionable. Irish ties this part
of the installation further by including a large check cashing
sign, an updated symbol of contemporary class struggle in the
Academy's present day neighborhood.
Since her earlier paintings of the 80s merged
an awkward suburban architecture with a fluid mock-Baroque painting
style, Irish has continued to expand her repertoire to include
ceramics, casting and large scale installations. Alternatively
feigning craft and enacting craft, her main aim is to construct
sincere content, and this new refined focus now includes more
subversion than simply irony. By combining her usual penchant
for history and painting with investigations of personal memories
of 60s radicalism, Irish comments on history, politics, and art
all at the same time. This history lesson is way overdue.
And yet the recent past is misread and
pliable. As the 1970s have graduated to ancient history in pop
cultural terms, it's difficult to believe there ever was a view
of the future as actively progressive. So it is disappointing
to realize that the country can move backwards as well as forwards,
that liberal thinkers can become conservatives, that civil disobedience
and youth can lead to nothing.
-James
Rosenthal, January, 2003
for
more information on this show, click
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