About Sociopolitical Art; What is it?

Sociopolitical art is a form of conceptual art where the idea to be expressed, by whatever artistic media, is both social and political in origin.

 Any art medium or style can fall into the category of sociopolitical, making it closer to a philosophy rather than an artistic style or auction category. At times an artist may feel the need to voice or sway an opinion, spread an idea, and try to enact a change within society. They will often look to analogy to present the argument. One thing represents another so that the message is told.

Sociopolitical art seeks to get a reaction from viewers. Shocking words or passionate imagery creates a nearly, or literally, interactive work of art. The effort of interpretation, at least, is required from the viewer. The motivation of the artist is about communication. Most art reflects and responds to changing social and political conditions. Sociopolitical art, however, wants the viewer to have an understanding of the relationship between the art itself and the concept the artist wishes to convey -- this art reflects what I have to say and not just what I see. Such artworks are often also part of the Existentialist movement. Dealing with matters of the human condition, they can expose the beauty, horror and humor in mankind. Parody and satire are devises frequently used to imprint a concept in a viewers mind through punchy humor. Not having much concern for being politically correct, the sociopolitical artist is involved in a cultural rebellion -- a connection of social revolution from mind to mind.

Below are different examples of sociopolitical art in imagery. The artist has two main choices for expression style within the category of sociopolitical -- "Open Expression" and "Definitive Expression". Open Expression leaves the viewer of the artwork with an open ended question or asks of them to continue to ponder the theme. It invites the viewer to either make or include his or her own point of view. Definitive Expression, however, makes a direct definite statement. The viewer has little doubt about the theme of the artwork or what could be it's intended meaning.

  An example of Open Expression, this piece deals with concepts of debate within American society; the separation of church and state through prayer in public schools. This example makes it fairly easy to discern what the main topics of conversation are, yet offers no definitive conclusion. The artist is making a statement that the conflict separates focus from the well being of the children, but excludes offering a personal preference towards one side or the other of the argument overall.

 Separation, a multi-media painting by Tree Pruitt, 2004. Based on an image from photographer Bryan James.

 

 

 

 Here is an example of Definitive Expression in sociopolitical art. This piece directly states an opinion on a social situation by using a pop culture advertising icon.

 Culture is Disintegrating, from NATO Artwork

(*Sociopolitical art definition, category and style is original content by the lensmaster.)

A More Subtle Example of Open Expression

"Restrictions", an emotive soft sculpture assemblage art piece by Tree Pruitt.

A conceptual art piece inspired by a Peruvian mummy that had been bound and buried, this piece is intended to reflect the restrictions within this life, how they can effect us emotionally & perhaps serve as a reminder not to carry those restrictions into the after life.

Find a separate lens soon on this art work and information about mummies from Peru and other mummy art forms.

Picasso's 1937 painting, Guernica

Although Pablo Picasso might have protested the title of "Sociopolitical Artist", he has non-the-less become one of the first examples of this expressive devise to come to mind. Thinking back to one of his first paintings, of a child kneeling at a communion rail, the author suspects most all of his works could be placed under the heading of sociopolitical; religious quests, emotions, family dynamics, political upheaval, social changes, female issues, and personal strife are all major themes in the works of Picasso.

An artist often isn't aware that he or she is creating a social statement. An event or change may occur to cause the artist to have a great need to react, to release strong emotions or opinions from within; to be reactionary. Reaction is essential in all art, as it is the reaction to a thing that causes the need to create; to take action in what may be the only way the artist is able. In a quote below, Pablo states, "My whole life as an artist has been nothing more than a continuous struggle against reaction and the death of art". Yet, even such a well known painter is subject to the overwhelming need to create a statement -- HIS REACTION -- about an event that struck him deeply.

Guernica is an Open Expression example of sociopolitical art. Though most all people who look upon it do get the artists message of the pain and destruction of war, Picasso is not directly spelling out his message; it is still open to interpretation or simple viewing. There is no road sign to tell us where this scene takes place. No dropping bombs are visible to tell us the destruction was not caused by a natural disaster or some other event. The viewer is left to ponder the emotional aspects of the image and to relate to what they see as they need. Because this painting is so very open in expression, it's sure to continue being personally interpreted by viewers for many, many years to come.

"The Spanish struggle is the fight of reaction against the people, against freedom. My whole life as an artist has been nothing more than a continuous struggle against reaction and the death of art. How could anybody think for a moment that I could be in agreement with reaction and death? ... In the panel on which I am working, which I shall call Guernica, and in all my recent works of art, I clearly express my abhorrence of the military caste which has sunk Spain in an ocean of pain and death." -- Picasso http://www.answers.com/topic/list-of-picasso-artworks-1931-1940

Below is, "911 Radio Description", an Open Expression painting by the lensmaster depicting the destructive events in New York on September eleven.

As the title suggests, this image was created based solely upon the description offered by news reporters on live radio that very day. Much like Picasso's Guernica this painting offers no direct opinion, but rather seeks to record the emotional impact of a tragic historical event.

The Art of Protest: From Vietnam to AIDS
Dada, Fluxus, and Situationist International

"Activist conceptual and performance art often owes a debt of influence to Dada, a form of anti-art which used satire and non-rational discourse to critique the First World War and its capitalist agenda. From its origins, Dada often had the feel of festival and agitation-propaganda, and challenged the elevation of art to elite status and high price tags in galleries. Their example inspired the group of artists associated with Fluxus, whose performances, installations, and conceptual art often expressed overt political intentions. For example, Wolf Vostell's Phänomene (1965) "involved the spontaneous contributions of poets, artists, and onlookers amidst the crumbling piles of broken cars (i.e., the detritus of capitalist production and destruction)" (136). Other Fluxus artists of note include Joseph Beuys, Yoko Ono, and Nam June Paik."

The Spanish painter and printmaker Francisco Goya (30 March 1746 - 16 April 1828) has been regarded both as the last of the Old Masters and as the first of the moderns. The subversive and subjective elements in his art provided a model for the work of later generations of artists, including Picasso. Unlike his fellow Spaniard Picasso, most of the depictions of the effects of war Goya chose to portray are examples of Definitive Expression in Sociopolitical Art because he'd often include text to let the viewer know which direction thoughts should travel on the subject at hand. Though Goya sometimes did literally spell out the subject matter, much of his work also becomes Open Expression as well because he doesn't tell you whether what's in the scene is right or wrong; the viewer is left to form personal thoughts and feelings.

Known as a chronicler of history, Goya produced numerous thought provoking paintings, drawings, and etchings such as the one shown here.



The etching includes the title of "No se puede saber por que", which translates as "No one knows why", and it is one example of many sociopolitical artworks produced by Goya where the artist portrays the unexplainable horrors of war; indeed no one knows why such acts are performed by one human upon another of kind. A publication from 1914 further explains Goya on this matter...

"About the greatest of human illusions he has no illusion. In drawing after drawing he states without mincing matters his conviction that to fight is after all only to murder. I think that it is this insistence not merely upon strife but upon murder that gives these drawings a character of horror more emphatic than that of any other representations of warfare. And it is not only against the barbarousness of war that he utters his passionate protest, but also against its tragical illogicality. It is not the business of art to attempt to solve the problem of pain or to hazard guesses at the riddle of the universe, and that Goya showed a just sense of its limitations in preferring to exhibit slices of life rather than to attempt an interpretation of the whole. He tosses us these raw and palpitating fragments and leaves us to digest them as best we may."

*Francisco Goya. (2009, May 19). In Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia. Retrieved 06:23, May 20, 2009, from http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Francisco_Goya&oldid=290994967

*The New York Public Library Digital Gallery
http://digitalgallery.nypl.org/nypldigital/id?1109956

*Goya - Disasters Of The War, originally published 1914
http://www.oldandsold.com/articles22/goya-13.shtml

"Act Like A Patriot", by Tree Pruitt (*See Larger Image). This modern art collage painting is a response to the American Patriot Act & on-going oil, gas prices & Middle East issues. It speaks of many political issues in one space. The two faces of government are shown -- the President and Vice President -- one offers a penny (or takes it) & the other holds out a cookie -- chocolate chip, of course. Lady America grows from his ribs like Eve in the primordial garden. She ignores the events by chatting away on a cell phone. It is our personal freedom that is dead as a skeleton in the grave. Words and phrases scattered through out the scene tell of the pictured social strife; including it's causes.
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Below is an example of sociopolitical poetry.
Multiple subjects are touched upon in one allegorical frame; Father Time, President G.W. Bush, an implied Christ like force, United Stated border patrol issues, and human maturity as a whole.

Thorn Bush Soliloquies

I hunger --
Yet Father Time asks for more.
I mourn --
But my tears move him not.
I become weary
Of deceptions built upon layers of disillusion --
Father Time protects only himself from the thorns.

My body thin and weak,
Holds fast to Father's promise.
A heart filled with childish faith
Lay tattered on a heap of reality trash.
Burn the pile!
Yet Father Time asks for more.

It is this, and then it's that --
We children suffer
While Father Time gets fat.
Share the life, share the expense --
We are all in this together!
But Father's not on the team --
Economic heart felt sabotage.

We give --
Thorn bush harvest --
Our blood for Fathers goblet.
He feeds --
On golden fields of highway grain
We bathe --
Our fragile naked bodies
Immersed in streams of nature bane.

We grieve --
The loss of freedom fair.
I ask where is dear Father?
High a' loft in easy chair!
I say --
To all my brothers and my sisters,
That it was us
Who set him there!

What is this Father
Without his children's mind?
Empty clock on fictitious shelf
A' waiting to be whined.
Father's voice,
Now faint within my ears --
Thorn bush illusion fails sharpness power,
Through passage of fragile years.

In this thorn bush soliloquy I hunger --
My body thin and weak.
It is this, and then it's that.
What is this Father?
We give,
We grieve,
We grow!

-- Tree Pruitt

I personally recall the first time I was aware of sociopolitical artwork. At the tender age of seven, a piece I'd seen had struck me with the pure concept of self realization and all of the implications of the work that my mind could comprehend at the time. I've continued to ponder it's meaning to myself; As the years of my life have gone by, it's truth reaches only deeper.

"Ceiling Painting", an important work of pioneering, avant-garde artist Yoko Ono invites the viewer to climb a white ladder, where, at the top, a magnifying glass attached by a chain hangs from a frame on the ceiling. The viewer uses the reading glass to discover a block letter "instruction" beneath the framed sheet of glass - it simply says "YES."; such small letters make such a large statement!

*Read about visits to see Yes Yoko Ono at the Walker Art Center
*
Yoko Ono Lennon profile at Instant Karma, bio & more.

Ceiling Painting/Yes Painting
Photograph By Marsha Ewing, see link above.

Winner of two MySpace Impact Awards -- Community Building and Social Justice -- this MySpace profile is a feast for the eyes. Filled with wonderful examples of modern sociopolitical arts! MySpace URL: http://www.myspace.com/paintersforhumanrights

Let's read a bit of info from this interesting profile page...

Have you ever considered how life would be if we did not have Human Rights....?

If you love and enjoy FREEDOM of SPEECH, THOUGHT, RELIGION, FAIR JUSTICE, EQUAL TREATMENT, PRIVACY, the RIGHT to PLAY, MOVE about, MARRIAGE, DEMOCRACY, BED and FOOD, CULTURE and ART etc%u2026 it is because we live in a society that respects and supports Human Rights to a greater or lesser degree. Without these rights we would be slaves. Wars, slave societies and police states have come and gone, but they have never really solved anything! These are uncertain times and we need to safeguard our basic rights and make it possible for all to strive to greater heights. These rights are precious ... especially to us artists. They should not be taken for granted.

And who protects your Human Rights? That's right YOU DO!
Visit the online gallery with works inspired by Human Rights from Artists for Human Rights.
Painters for Human Rights® is a grassroots movement for painters to use their creativity and art to promote Human Rights. Painters of all mediums, race, creed or religion are welcome to make a statement and submit their work. The only requirement being - that they must fully agree, support and demonstrate the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

Artists for Human Rights (AFHR) was formed with the purpose of bringing artists together with the common cause of raising awareness of human rights around the world. AFHR purpose is educational. Artists have the ability to influence and change opinions on a large scale through their stories, dance, music and pictures; enlightening and elevating a culture and thus helping to bring about more tolerance and peace in our troubled world.

AFHR was formed as a part of the International Foundation for Human Rights and Tolerance by artists who have taken up the challenge to make a difference and increase human rights awareness around the world.

 Most certainly a tale of social situations, Oscar Wilde's sharp wit created what was close to being one of the first modern horror novels, but one with lessons to heed. Never one to preach, dear Oscar paints a picture sure to alter your inner vision and possibly your own personal portrait.

 I'm pleased to help spread the efforts of *Project Gutenberg's, The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde*. Read it online for FREE! Please consider making a donation, while you're at the site, to help keep quality literature under curious noses... as darling Oscar would have wanted! ;)

 "You don't understand me, Harry," answered the artist. "Of course I am not like him. I know that perfectly well. Indeed, I should be sorry to look like him. You shrug your shoulders? I am telling you the truth.  There is a fatality about all physical and intellectual distinction, the sort of fatality that seems to dog through history the faltering steps of kings. It is better not to be different from one's fellows. The ugly and the stupid have the best of it in this world. They can sit at their ease and gape at the play. If they know nothing of victory, they are at least spared the knowledge of defeat. They live as we all should live -- undisturbed, indifferent, and without disquiet. They neither bring ruin upon others, nor ever receive it from alien hands.
 Your rank and wealth, Harry; my brains, such as they are -- my art, whatever it may be worth; Dorian Gray's good looks -- we shall all suffer for what the gods have given us, suffer terribly."

  Image included is, "Impact of Emotion", an assemblage oil painting by Tree Pruitt. Visit the artists gallery shop.