At the moment I'm reading "Hitler and the Power of Aesthetics," by Frederic Spotts, Overlook, 2003. Looks like our guy took it all from Adolph's playbook.
I've had a book called "Artists Under Hitler" on my bedside stack for weeks....a subject I keep meaning to get into. I'm hoping things never get that bad, though I'm sure if Mr. Trump had his way there would be quite a few artists he'd send to El Salvador.
Yes, it can certainly happen here--and has already begun to happen. I have a friend in D.C. who volunteers on Fridays as a guide at the Kennedy Center. We already know that whole Board has been fired to make room for Trump's appointees. My friend says that the guides have been instructed to "play dumb," and pretend they haven't heard anything about the firings yet. And to wait for further "instructions"....
Very valuable thinking. Waiting for him to come after the National Endowment for the Arts...just a matter of time. Who woulda thought he would involve himself in the arts???
Such a timely and eye-opening piece, Ann. But we can't lose hope. If Democrats want to win in the midterms, they need to speak in concrete terms that masses understand (many don't really know what terms like fascism, hegemony or even democracy mean.) rather than abstractions. Talking about salaries, groceries, hospital costs, freedom to choose, and the like will help us in the mid-terms.
I agree with you but I'm afraid the Dems are losing their clout. We may have to wait till prices go through the roof and we're en route to a recession before the "people" fully wake up. Truth is, this is a coup and we need to realize the Musk-Trump strategy: Throw as much dust as possible in people's eyes, announce funding cuts, take over arts organizations, fire people en masse, and maybe there will be so much confusion, no one will speak up. I have hope in a lot of grass-roots organizations and am following their directives for phoning and organizing.
I'm sorry that I didn't get a submission together for your Artists Respond to the Election solicitation. I had a sketch of a wild-eyed, cackling Kamala with her hand slapped over a man's mouth, with suited figures behind her representing all the federal agencies that censored Americans under Biden - the CDC, FBI, CISA, DHS, State Department, DHHS, and more.
Fascism is too damaged a brand to return in a form recognizable as such. But in "The Original Fascist," a 2020 essay by Angelo Codevilla, he said that the titular figure (Mussolini, not Hitler; the former had a low opinion of Nazism) had admirers all over the political spectrum, including FDR. The admiration was mutual. "After Franklin Roosevelt’s inauguration in 1933, Mussolini’s enthusiasm for likening the New Deal to fascism’s political-economic order was tempered only by the need not to give additional ammunition to FDR’s domestic opponents, who were saying precisely that." But fascism lives on in modern bureaucratic technocracy, for which progressives have developed such an appetite that the Biden DHS tried to stand up a Disinformation Governance Board. Yes, "it" can happen here. It nearly did.
Wissel was a pretty good painter. Ziegler was not. They used to mock him as the Meister des Deutschen Schamhaares. It's rude, look it up if you're curious. It's easy to dismiss these guys because they were unrepentant National Socialists, but so was Nolde. History is complicated.
Franklin has some points, some rhetoric, and he knows some stuff. Alas, he proves with this column he's one of those "both sides" people who thinks the right wing talking points about "censored" men and problems associated with large bureacracies are enough to overlook Nazi-saluting thugs like Musk and Bannon slashing to pieces a government that helps poor and middle class people a hell of a lot more than anything Trump will deliver.
I'm not one of those "both sides" people at all. A month after October 7, I wrote that "postliberal progressivism, the ascendant politics in the art world, is a pollution of traditional progressive priorities with anti-Western bile, totalitarianism, and old-fashioned Judenhass."
Which is to say that I believe that contemporary progressivism is unambiguously worse than the center-right regime in office, by far. But I don't lead with that when conversing with progressives, and I don't presume to know their minds better than they do. Occasionally, one returns the favor, and we can have a productive conversation.
I'm glad you are writing about this. And yes, I see it happening - it already is. For more reading, if you can stand it, check out "Totalitarian Art: In the Soviet Union, the Third Reich, Fascist Italy and the People's Republic of China" by Igor Golomstock
And in film, "The Architecture of Doom" (1989) by Peter Cohen, is a doc that makes you wonder if an acceptance to art school might have changed European History.
At the moment I'm reading "Hitler and the Power of Aesthetics," by Frederic Spotts, Overlook, 2003. Looks like our guy took it all from Adolph's playbook.
I've had a book called "Artists Under Hitler" on my bedside stack for weeks....a subject I keep meaning to get into. I'm hoping things never get that bad, though I'm sure if Mr. Trump had his way there would be quite a few artists he'd send to El Salvador.
Yes, it can certainly happen here--and has already begun to happen. I have a friend in D.C. who volunteers on Fridays as a guide at the Kennedy Center. We already know that whole Board has been fired to make room for Trump's appointees. My friend says that the guides have been instructed to "play dumb," and pretend they haven't heard anything about the firings yet. And to wait for further "instructions"....
So why the f don't they quit? Or even take a stand and say what they know? I mean they're nothing but volunteers!!!!
Democracy dies when people are cowards.
If they are volunteers, then quitting seems a smart option. What can Trump do? Fire them?
P.S. I just read this morning that ticket sales are down 60 percent at the Kennedy Center. :)
Very valuable thinking. Waiting for him to come after the National Endowment for the Arts...just a matter of time. Who woulda thought he would involve himself in the arts???
I am afraid that horse has already left the barn. I'll report more next Sunday. https://chicago.suntimes.com/entertainment-and-culture/2025/02/14/trumps-new-arts-funding-guidelines-chicago-nea-arts-grants-jeopardy
Such a timely and eye-opening piece, Ann. But we can't lose hope. If Democrats want to win in the midterms, they need to speak in concrete terms that masses understand (many don't really know what terms like fascism, hegemony or even democracy mean.) rather than abstractions. Talking about salaries, groceries, hospital costs, freedom to choose, and the like will help us in the mid-terms.
I agree with you but I'm afraid the Dems are losing their clout. We may have to wait till prices go through the roof and we're en route to a recession before the "people" fully wake up. Truth is, this is a coup and we need to realize the Musk-Trump strategy: Throw as much dust as possible in people's eyes, announce funding cuts, take over arts organizations, fire people en masse, and maybe there will be so much confusion, no one will speak up. I have hope in a lot of grass-roots organizations and am following their directives for phoning and organizing.
Frightening truth. Irene
Excellent Post Ann. Thank You
I'm sorry that I didn't get a submission together for your Artists Respond to the Election solicitation. I had a sketch of a wild-eyed, cackling Kamala with her hand slapped over a man's mouth, with suited figures behind her representing all the federal agencies that censored Americans under Biden - the CDC, FBI, CISA, DHS, State Department, DHHS, and more.
Fascism is too damaged a brand to return in a form recognizable as such. But in "The Original Fascist," a 2020 essay by Angelo Codevilla, he said that the titular figure (Mussolini, not Hitler; the former had a low opinion of Nazism) had admirers all over the political spectrum, including FDR. The admiration was mutual. "After Franklin Roosevelt’s inauguration in 1933, Mussolini’s enthusiasm for likening the New Deal to fascism’s political-economic order was tempered only by the need not to give additional ammunition to FDR’s domestic opponents, who were saying precisely that." But fascism lives on in modern bureaucratic technocracy, for which progressives have developed such an appetite that the Biden DHS tried to stand up a Disinformation Governance Board. Yes, "it" can happen here. It nearly did.
Wissel was a pretty good painter. Ziegler was not. They used to mock him as the Meister des Deutschen Schamhaares. It's rude, look it up if you're curious. It's easy to dismiss these guys because they were unrepentant National Socialists, but so was Nolde. History is complicated.
Franklin has some points, some rhetoric, and he knows some stuff. Alas, he proves with this column he's one of those "both sides" people who thinks the right wing talking points about "censored" men and problems associated with large bureacracies are enough to overlook Nazi-saluting thugs like Musk and Bannon slashing to pieces a government that helps poor and middle class people a hell of a lot more than anything Trump will deliver.
I'm not one of those "both sides" people at all. A month after October 7, I wrote that "postliberal progressivism, the ascendant politics in the art world, is a pollution of traditional progressive priorities with anti-Western bile, totalitarianism, and old-fashioned Judenhass."
https://dissidentmuse.substack.com/p/look-whos-suddenly-interested-in
Which is to say that I believe that contemporary progressivism is unambiguously worse than the center-right regime in office, by far. But I don't lead with that when conversing with progressives, and I don't presume to know their minds better than they do. Occasionally, one returns the favor, and we can have a productive conversation.
Well, let's just say I vehemently disagree, and leave it at that.
To quote Joan Didion, Oh wow.
I'm glad you are writing about this. And yes, I see it happening - it already is. For more reading, if you can stand it, check out "Totalitarian Art: In the Soviet Union, the Third Reich, Fascist Italy and the People's Republic of China" by Igor Golomstock
And in film, "The Architecture of Doom" (1989) by Peter Cohen, is a doc that makes you wonder if an acceptance to art school might have changed European History.
I'll try to find Architecture of Doom....but I don't think I can look at any more totalitarian art. My eyes are still aching from Sunday's post.
yeap
It is good that you are writing about this!!!
Brilliant post. Thank youi.