http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/modern-art-was-cia-weapon-1578808.html
http://chronicle.com/article/How-Iowa-Flattened-Literature/144531/
the CIA is at fault for both shitty modern art and bland MFA writing. Thanks lads
>http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/modern-art-was-cia-weapon-1578808.html
This sounds like a 40 page digression in a Pynchon novel.
Pol ;^) is always right
>>7877531
>>7877537
lmao
>>7877531
>http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/modern-art-was-cia-weapon-1578808.html
lol, america has literally never contributed anything to culture, modern art was born, developed and died on the continent
>>7877537
That's a hell of a random name.
>Agency used American modern art - including the works of such artists as Jackson Pollock, Robert Motherwell, Willem de Kooning and Mark Rothko - as a weapon in the Cold War. [...] [The] CIA fostered and promoted American Abstract Expressionist painting around the world for more than 20 years.
>Why did the CIA support them? Because in the propaganda war with the Soviet Union, this new artistic movement could be held up as proof of the creativity, the intellectual freedom, and the cultural power of the US. Russian art, strapped into the communist ideological straitjacket, could not compete.
>>7878017
>The decision to include culture and art in the US Cold War arsenal was taken as soon as the CIA was founded in 1947. Dismayed at the appeal communism still had for many intellectuals and artists in the West, the new agency set up a division, the Propaganda Assets Inventory, which at its peak could influence more than 800 newspapers, magazines and public information organisations. They joked that it was like a Wurlitzer jukebox: when the CIA pushed a button it could hear whatever tune it wanted playing across the world.
>Initially, more open attempts were made to support the new American art. In 1947 the State Department organised and paid for a touring international exhibition entitled "Advancing American Art", with the aim of rebutting Soviet suggestions that America was a cultural desert. But the show caused outrage at home, prompting Truman to make his Hottentot remark and one bitter congressman to declare: "I am just a dumb American who pays taxes for this kind of trash." The tour had to be cancelled.
>The US government now faced a dilemma. This philistinism, combined with Joseph McCarthy's hysterical denunciations of all that was avant-garde or unorthodox, was deeply embarrassing. It discredited the idea that America was a sophisticated, culturally rich democracy. It also prevented the US government from consolidating the shift in cultural supremacy from Paris to New York since the 1930s. To resolve this dilemma, the CIA was brought in.
>"We wanted to unite all the people who were writers, who were musicians, who were artists, to demonstrate that the West and the United States was devoted to freedom of expression and to intellectual achievement, without any rigid barriers as to what you must write, and what you must say, and what you must do, and what you must paint, which was what was going on in the Soviet Union. I think it was the most important division that the agency had, and I think that it played an enormous role in the Cold War."
>He confirmed that his division had acted secretly because of the public hostility to the avant-garde: "It was very difficult to get Congress to go along with some of the things we wanted to do - send art abroad, send symphonies abroad, publish magazines abroad. That's one of the reasons it had to be done covertly. It had to be a secret. In order to encourage openness we had to be secret."
>If this meant playing pope to this century's Michelangelos, well, all the better: "It takes a pope or somebody with a lot of money to recognise art and to support it," Mr Braden said. "And after many centuries people say, 'Oh look! the Sistine Chapel, the most beautiful creation on Earth!' It's a problem that civilisation has faced ever since the first artist and the first millionaire or pope who supported him. And yet if it hadn't been for the multi-millionaires or the popes, we wouldn't have had the art."
>>7878024
>In 1958 the touring exhibition "The New American Painting", including works by Pollock, de Kooning, Motherwell and others, was on show in Paris. The Tate Gallery was keen to have it next, but could not afford to bring it over. Late in the day, an American millionaire and art lover, Julius Fleischmann, stepped in with the cash and the show was brought to London.
>The money that Fleischmann provided, however, was not his but the CIA's. It came through a body called the Farfield Foundation, of which Fleischmann was president, but far from being a millionaire's charitable arm, the foundation was a secret conduit for CIA funds.
>"We would go to somebody in New York who was a well-known rich person and we would say, 'We want to set up a foundation.' We would tell him what we were trying to do and pledge him to secrecy, and he would say, 'Of course I'll do it,' and then you would publish a letterhead and his name would be on it and there would be a foundation. It was really a pretty simple device."
Julius Fleischmann was well placed for such a role. He sat on the board of the International Programme of the Museum of Modern Art in New York - as did several powerful figures close to the CIA.
>>7878024
>>7878026
how do the americans view CIA? I'm not from the west and the more I read about CIA, the more i feel inclined to think that it's kind of a selfish sociopathic manipulative cunt.
Ffs mate, I could still understand (but not forgive) its interference in other countries' politics and government but why does it have to stick its nose into the arts as well?
I mean just fuck off and die already. such a cancerous organization.
does anyone feel this way about cia? Or do muricans idolize this organization through a lense of "patriotism"/chauvinism?
Pseudo intellectuals in ruins... Oh wait, I'm wrong, they've all moved in to slam poetry and postmodern literature by now
>>7878036
depends on the 'murican
>>7878036
Why other countries hate the CIA
>everything you said
Why americans hate the CIA
>They're DEFINITELY hiding aliens from us, fuck the CIA!
>>7878036
they supported the murderers of dr. salvador allende with weapons, bought out newspapers for anti-socialist propaganda and helped introduce an inhumane regime.
allende was the last latin american hero. che guevara ain't fucking shit. i will never forgive them for that. fuck the cia.
>>7877531
i really like pollock personally and i think the idea of using art as a weapon is actually rather creative. probably not very effective though. yes, they succeeded in promoting art, but i doubt they had the effect they were hoping for. gorbatschow did all the work in the end.
also both koons and pollock would have certainly rose to stardom on their own anyway, hey just sped up the process.
>>7877531
The CIA may have certainly helped the rise of it but its silly to say that it would not have happened without the CIA's backing because many of those same currents of thought had already long been around and things would have gone in that artistic direction eventually.
>>7878036
The average American is relatively-uninformed and views them positively as a group that helps protect the country and does spying etc.
A small percent of the population views them very negatively and thinks they always only do bad stuff like funding jihadis and organizing coups and regime change etc.
Even though they do all that stuff though the truth of the matter is more complicated and most intelligent and informed Americans probably understand this. The CIA and similar groups have good and bad people in them and there is a constant battle within these groups between people trying to do nefarious or morally-questionable stuff and other people trying to stop and prevent that. Even if the CIA does do a lot of organizing coups or funding jihadis its often at the direction of the White House and so there isn't much they can always do to say no. They do a lot of good though and they do help protect American citizens and US soil from terrorist attacks regardless of how much they may have helped terrorists in foreign countries for geopolitical reasons like helping Jihadists fights the Soviets or the Syrian government etc.
>>7878082
Allende was a fool who lost the support of the people who voted for him at about the time of the coup. Also, while the U.S. supported a previous coup attempt, that one failed. The one that succeeded had nothing to do with the U.S. whatsoever.
Also, Pinochet, for all his ugliness, made Chile a borderline first world country. If Allende had stayed in power, Chile would look more like El Salvador.
>>7878571
>Allende was a fool who lost the support of the people who voted for him at about the time of the coup.
He was elected on narrow margins in the first place but much of the lost support that happened before the coup was caused by the deteriorating economy and living standards that were caused themselves by the economic blockade enacted by the Nixon administration in response to nationalizations of companies that were happening in Chile. Under Nixon's direction, the US terminated all financial aid to Chile and loans from international financial organizations were also blocked. Before the US and groups it controlled/influenced started to take hostile economic measures against Chile the economy was doing pretty good under him and living standards increased. He wasn't a fool if we judge by how he managed the economy which he did pretty well until the United States put effort into fucking it up.
>Also, while the U.S. supported a previous coup attempt, that one failed. The one that succeeded had nothing to do with the U.S. whatsoever.
Kek, if you are talking about the 1973 coup that removed Allende, that was almost completely run by the CIA. They had been giving serious aid for years to the groups and factions that carried out the coup and they were also heavily involved in the actual coup itself. There is a mountain of verified documentation of this and even the CIA has recently admitted that it basically ran the coup and has declassified and released documents proving it.
>Also, Pinochet, for all his ugliness, made Chile a borderline first world country. If Allende had stayed in power, Chile would look more like El Salvador.
Not really. Pinochet did some good but he basically just turned Chile into a tax haven while selling off assets to foreigners, that can only take you so far. A lot of what makes Chile a first world country with a good economy was due to the post-Pinochet centrist Aylwin government and the center-leftist government of Ruiz-Tagle. In terms of modernizing Chile and raising living standards they did as much as Pinochet if not more. If the US hadn't reacted with hostile economic measures to Allende in the first place and loans and aid were not cut off then the end result of Chile's modern economy today probably would have been close to being the same anyway.
>>7878249
>they do help protect American citizens and US soil from terrorist attacks
Lmaoing@u, yeah from terrorists they funded
>>7878249
When it comes to any intelligence agency in any country, they're all always going to be up to a lot of fucked-up shit. Intelligence agencies are the skeletons in every country's closet. The CIA just happens to be the biggest one.
>>7878036
Military member here.
The CIA scares the absolute piss out of me.
>>7878036
idk it might actually have more interesting aims than our government
>>7880735
Any stories about them you'd like to share? Even rumors would be interesting to see.
>>7880753
I've never had any dealings with them personally, but I know from time to time they commandeer our remote satellite station up in Alaska.
>>7880706
>CIA
>worse than MOSSAD
Ha.
>>7880759
That doesn't sound that spooky in and of itself. Come on, tell us what freaks you out so much about them.
>>7880762
>implying killing a few palestinians, ugandans american servicemen and nazis has anything on what the cia's been up to
>>7878036
If I take your paintings down would you die?
>>7878036
American here
We need an intelligence agency like the CIA for national security, but like so many other government agencies it has become an inoperable tumor in our country
The CIA serves itself first, the government second, and the American people last.
We can't even defund them anymore, because they run the most sophisticated currency counterfeiting operation in the world. So called superbills that can fool even treasury directors roll off their presses every day
The only option at this point would be full liquidation and seizure of all CIA assets, but you start down that road and they'll be jumping ship to Mossad and SVR overnight
It's a fucking shit situation
>>7879322
rightist btfo
>>7879322
As is always the case, the capitalists create prosperity, and the socialists take all the credit while running the country into the ground (after which, of course, they blame the capitalists)
>>7880889
>have no argument whatever
>deploy ad hom nonsense instead
I would tell you to go back to /lit/, but it seems you're already here
>>7880889
Can't have socialism without a large and thriving capitalist economy to fund and sustain it
Can't redistribute wealth and income without having wealth and income to begin with, and it is not socialism which creates those things for you
Try running a country like Sudan according to socialist policies. Let me know how it works.
I'm sure you'll make the government officials very wealthy
>>7877531
K I didn't read the second article at all but bear with me, I was wondering if any of you have taken a creative writing class in Canada/US, have you noticed that the assigned fiction readings are all really samey?
Pretty much every short story had a similar style, sort of straightforward prose with earthy metaphors, family drama, conflict revolving around basic human needs. We also never read anything written before 1970. No Joyce, no Faulkner, no PoMo, almost no translated fiction of any kind.
Is it the CIA's fault my assigned reading was so boring?
/lit/ misses the interesting point in order to delve into /pol/ tier reactionary shitposting yet again. why do I come here again?
>>7880930
>/lit/ didn't coddle me and give credence to OP's idiotic leftist fantasy about the CIA being responsible for all "bad" writing that comes out of MFA programs
You know there's a website for people just like you where you never ever EVER have to hear opinions different than your own. It's called Reddit and it's basically built around the idea that morons get to decide what information they hear and how they hear it. I really think you would prefer it to this website
>>7880989
>You know there's a website for people just like you where you never ever EVER have to hear opinions different than your own
lmao lovely self diagnosis there pal
>>7881002
Armchair psychologist is a fan of Foucault, what a shocker.
>>7877963
it started in europe lad
>>7880989
>/pol/ comes into a thread about a subject that has nothing to do with them
>makes it a /pol/ thread
>"you guys just don't like hearing different opinions!"
you took the redditpill my friend
>>7881019
it had already existed for over half a century. abstract expressionism isn't the whole of "modern art" in fact it was basically the end
>>7880905
that's a general 4chan thing to do, bucko
>>7881023
>somebody asks a question about American perceptions of the CIA
>people give answers that don't subscribe to the standard leftist view that the CIA is responsible for all evil on the planet
>some of them even defend capitalism
>"/pol/ invaded me again! they're everywhere! They don't even think Allende was the savior of Chile!"
There's really no sign of /pol/ anywhere in this thread except near the top of the thread where somebody ironically mentions them in reference to the board's penchant for conspiracy theories about 'degenerate art'. The /pol/ bogeyman is just another lazy leftist way of dismissing claims they don't agree with so they don't actually have to engage them. "It's just far right trolls! Nobody could possible disagree with such logical and correct opinions about art and politics!"
If you thought this thread had some sort of potential for literary discussion and was never explicitly political, you're naive.
If you think there's any credibility to the claim that CIA made art shitty, you're a moron who believes in fairytales about shadowy men orchestrating all the evil in your life.
I'm going to bed now. Sorry for intruding on your safe space
>>7881061
You retard leftists endorse modern art, it's conservative /pol/tards who wank over classicism.
Russia won the Cold War. Exporting their filth into America's Mainstream.
The Spastic Autism coming out of the American Universities is Society destroying.
Feminism in Mother Russia get punished, in America it gets money.
>>7881084
Great job proving his point
>>7881089
actually no, b/c not all of us here are autistic fucks
>>7881089
the point is your a fucking nerd and kill yourself
>>7878571
>>7879322
wasn't pinochet regime considered quite brutal since it was responsible for the torture, murder and kidnapping of thousands of allende supporters? And instead of handing over power to a civilian government, pinochet practically became a dictator?
Also, looking up this stuff I found tons of sources verifying CIA's direct involvement in allende's overthrow and their continued efforts at destabilizing chile's economy and discrediting allende and his socialist efforts.
What was the motive though? why would the CIA give a shit if chile reached economic prosperity through socialist policies? Is it because that would provide existential proof of socialist/collectivist policies actually working out which would be a threat to the "commie" boogeyman that was shown to all muricans to inspire hate against soviet union?
Really, I'm just guessing here but why were communism and socialism demonized the the american population so much?
Any literature I can look up regarding this?
>>7881061
Not who you responded to.
I appreciate your attempt to exorcise the /pol/ boogeyman and agree with you on the laziness of discrediting opinions using it.
However, before you take the righteous moral high ground, I want you to know that your attempt at dismissing the article is equally shitty if not shittier.
>If you think the article is right you're a MORON.
what kind of an idiot does one have to be to condemn AND still use a boogeyman in the same post? Either post content that adds to the discussion or get the fuck out and stop bullshitting with your sermon.
If you actually read the fucking article which I doubt you did you'd realize that this information is a sort of confession from someone who
>was chief of the Soviet division of the CIA's Operations Directorate in the 1950s and 1960s and was an expert on the USSR and defectors.
but no. the cia is confessing probably as ajoke or something right?
>>7881131
It goes back to Joe McCarthy. His influence on American perceptions of socialism persists to this day. What people don't understand is that it was just a cynical political ploy on his part, so they take the demonization of all things socialist for granted, sometimes even buying into retarded explanations that later whitewashed and rationalized it. I wouldn't be surprised if Ayn Rand was a CIA asset.
>>7881155
hahaha nerd
>>7880735
Hello fellow American, I hate the CIA too! say, what have yo heard about those ruffians?
What are some good books on modern/contemporary art?
>>7877531
>Modern art was shilled to prove other countries how free USA is
Tell me something not completely obvious
>>7880979
>As is always the case, capitalist investment funds technological advancement, and the capitalists watch prosperity increase while leftists claim they are running the country into the ground (meanwhile, of course, the leftists live better lives than before thanks to the capitalists)
>>7882227
>technological investment didn't exist before the advent of capitalism
By your logic we like stone age humans before capitalism.
Holy shit the delusion is real.
>>7881155
He's a 'merican. Don't go too hard on him. About 80% of the media during the cold-war was propaganda according to the CIA themselves. Well, his media is still as fucked today. (it's ok usa, it's shit(but not that shit) everywhere else too.)
