Abusive, Cartoonish, Obscene: How Kara Walker Painted Trump’s America Priscilla Frank, in the article, Abusive, Cartoonish, Obscene: How Kara Walker Painted Trump’s America argues that no other time than now is Walker’s art more relevant. In explaining the detail of art with near extremities, and drawing attention to the raw emotions evoked, author Frank is connecting the themes to the current real life under this presidency.
When she refers to Walker’s “Christ’s Entry into Journalism”, she elaborates, “Walker’s masterpiece feeds off the logic of legends, nightmares and clichés, carefully arranged through suspicion, paranoia and twisted pleasure. In some unavoidable ways the painting’s composition resembles Trump’s twitter feed. The biting caricatures mirror Trump’s references to public figures slighted by belittling nicknames. Walker’s conjuring of knotted up histories recalls Trump’s habit of presenting bigoted historical falsehoods as facts. The jokey nature of the swampy gathering alludes to Trump’s common defense: that his most loathsome comments, memes and jabs are made in jest.” The paragraph overall draws the negative comparisons between the crudeness of the work and of Trump in order to visualize the connection between these two. She uses the visual aspects to conjure up remembrance of the president’s actions. Frank’s diction admires the work of the artist, Kara Walker, while putting more importance of her relevance in Trump’s presidential term. Words like “mangled”, “disjointed”; phrases like “biting caricatures”and “muddling victims and oppressors in a universally shameful chaos of degradation” tell of Walker’s style, drawing attention to the visual effect, but also describing the imagery that’s supporting the main point. These words and phrases create a negative connotation and generate to the implied idea that Walker’s aspects play against the very pristine art world as well as display the perspective of a woman like Walker. There is not a variety of use of the rhetorical appeals, but the use of one appeal plays a major part. This was a statement by Walker: I don’t really feel the need to write a statement about a painting show. I know what you all expect from me and I have complied up to a point. But frankly I am tired, tired of standing up, being counted, tired of “having a voice” or worse “being a role model.” Tired, true, of being a featured member of my racial group and/or my gender niche. It’s too much, and I write this knowing full well that my right, my capacity to live in this Godforsaken country [...] is under threat by random groups of white (male) supremacist goons who flaunt a kind of patched together notion of race purity with flags and torches and impressive displays of perpetrator-as-victim sociopathy. I roll my eyes, fold my arms and wait. How many ways can a person say racism is the real bread and butter of our American mythology ... ?” The mention of Walker shows the type of character the artist is leading as: a woman who sees the threat and identifies. Her style is derived from showing the truth, and that does not shy from involving the current political climate in her visual mentions. The sense of it is that she has done it in many ways because racism, hatred has just been nonstop. The inclusion of the quote gives Walker’s credo to the argument, and therefore, propels it. When mentioning Walker’s “A Subtlety”, she doesn’t shy away from the image, “a 75-foot-long, 40-foot tall sphinx sculpture made from sugar...with viewers flocking to take a selfie with the massive creature, sometimes pointing suggestively at her breasts, ass and labia”. Nowhere more than in the expression of the paintings by Frank do we see the tone of the writing most strongly exemplified. The author is one to avoid simplicity and paints a picture of the art as well as its message. It is malicious, as the tone implies to the art and the art contributes to the tone. The tone is explicit in turn. The purpose of this article is to give an opinion of the relative importance of an artist’s work to the political climate, maybe help the readers formulate an opinion on its artistic capabilities of prediction. Frank’s visualization of the different works, from which the ideas suggested were explained, were probably most clarifying for the readers and the purpose--a backing of the source which is then compared. It is not too inane to have this purpose especially since the author has stated what has already been said and done by only one head of state. The craziness of the pictures in the collages shown and spoken about has an allusion to the near craziness of the actions performed. What can be said is that the purpose has a strong position in its field of the arts. The structure of this article is from an explanatory stance, and draws more from a general opinion than from the author’s own personal feelings. The argument stems from the analysis of Walker’s work and ethics. With it comes a clarification of portrayals: racism and injustice in the past and present. The description of Walker’s art and situations that stemmed for it are jarring to realize and therefore make the argument seem more powerful. In terms of an artistic argument and comparison, Frank’s is solid in its expressive respect.
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AuthorTheresa Washington is a student in the 10th grade and an upcoming observer of The Huffington Post. She takes part in North Cobb's Speech and Debate team, as well as the FFLA (Future Female Leaders of America). Archives
February 2018
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