#William Gropper

[thefugitivesaint]

William Gropper (1897-1977), ''New Masses'', Vol. 5, #4, 1929 Source

[oldsardens]

William Gropper - Doomsday Rhapsody

[audiemurphy1945]

William Gropper, Democratic National Convention, 1968

[ursine-sister]

MOMA

[alwaysalwaysalwaysthesea]

"After Election" by William Gropper, in the November 12, 1935 New Masses.

(source: marxists.org)

[degeneratedworker]

“Tax The Rich“ William Gropper New Masses Magazine United States of America July 9, 1935

[le-dernier-soupir]

Construction of a Dam (detail), by William Gropper, 1939.

[commiepinkofag]

William Gropper, The Liberator, May 1919

[byneddiedingo]

Clark Gable and Carole Lombard in No Man of Her Own (Wesley Ruggles, 1932)

Cast: Clark Gable, Carole Lombard, Dorothy Mackaill, Grant Mitchell, Elizabeth Patterson, George Barbier, J. Farrell MacDonald, Tommy Conlon, Walter Walker, Paul Ellis, Charley Grapewin. Screenplay: Maurine Dallas Watkins, Milton Herbert Gropper, Edmund Goulding, Benjamin Glazer, based on a novel by Val Lewton. Cinematography: Lee Tover. Film editing: Otho Lovering. Costume design: Travis Banton. 

If actors weren't cattle, as Alfred Hitchcock is reported to have said, they were at least property, and their studios treated them as such. Clark Gable was becoming one of MGM's most valuable properties when he was loaned out to Paramount to make the only film in which he starred with Carole Lombard, who later became his wife. It was part of a complicated talent swamp initiated by Marion Davies, who had clout with MGM because of her relationship with William Randolph Hearst, who produced films for her that were distributed by MGM. Davies wanted Bing Crosby for a movie, so Paramount traded him to MGM for Gable and No Man of Her Own. Lombard became his co-star only because Miriam Hopkins didn't want to take second billing to Gable. The studio mountains labored to bring forth a cinematic mouse: a passable romantic comedy remembered only for the star teaming. Gable and Lombard are very good in it, though he comes off somewhat better than she does. Lombard was best in movies that gave her license to clown, like Twentieth Century (Howard Hawks, 1934) and My Man Godfrey (Gregory La Cava, 1936). In No Man of Her Own she's simply a woman who knows what she wants, and it isn't necessarily Gable, it's just to get out of the dull little town where she's the librarian. Gable on the other hand is in a role tailor-made for him: "Babe" Stewart, a raffish professional poker player who's as adept at wooing women as he is at cheating at cards. On the verge of getting caught by the detective (J. Farrell MacDonald) who's been tailing him, he skips town and winds up in the burg that Lombard's Connie Randall wants to escape. She catches his eye -- in one pre-Code scene she climbs a ladder and he looks up her skirt -- and with improbable speed they get married. Eventually she finds out that he's not the stockbroker he pretends to be, but nothing fazes her. He gets in trouble again, but just as he's about to take it on the lam, deserting her, he finds of course that he really loves her. The story lacks snap and tension: It was cobbled together from several sources, nominally from a novel by Val Lewton called No Bed of Her Own, a title the Hays Office nixed, but also from another story in Paramount's files. What life the film has comes from Wesley Ruggles's direction and from its performers, including Dorothy Mackaill as Babe's former partner in card-sharping. Lombard and Gable work well together, but reportedly didn't strike any off-screen sparks at the time -- they were both married to other people. They met again at a party four years later and were married in 1939.   

[warsofasoiaf]

On the subject, what was so bad about McCarthyism? I mean, people spying for hostile (or even friendly) countries is bad, right? Or did Soviet engineering take them nuclear all by themselves? Did McCarthy go after anyone who was not a government employee? Did he have anyone arrested? I read the "Have you no decency" line in context and it was nonsense that everyone agrees was as brilliant as the Emperor's new clothes.

McCarthyism isn't just McCarthy chairing the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, it encompasses much of the attitudes of the Second Red Scare. Anyway, McCarthy did question people who weren't government employees, like William Gropper and Rockwell Kent.

Espionage was a problem in the United States, and the US was right to investigate the CPUSA for its Soviet funding and use of resources to facilitate Soviet espionage. I don't believe that CPUSA's statements that they did not seek the violent overthrow of the US government was true, I think many members would have been quite happy to overthrow the United States government and replace it with one that put them on top if they had the capability (which they never did). But that was never proven (and is almost impossible to prove anyway), and unless it was, its members had the right to freedom of association and not to be criminalized for it. Individuals that committed espionage, like the Rosenbergs (anyone who says that they were political prisoners killed for their beliefs has not read the Venona decrypts or is just straight-up lying) were definitely guilty and the US was right to convict them of espionage. But mere membership in the group is not a crime, and it was used as such in the Foley Square trial. So I criticize McCarthyism because it violated central civil liberties. And yes, I'm quite aware that the rights and consideration I extend to others are not reciprocated.

I also criticize McCarthyism on practical grounds, because most Soviet spies that were discovered were not done through McCarthy, but rather by traditional espionage and counter-espionage tactics. Most of the spies weren't even on McCarthy's lists, and of the 159 names that McCarthy had, only nine were ever proven to have assisted in Soviet espionage efforts. So for all that, it wasn't very effective.

Thanks for the question, Anon.

SomethingLikeALawyer, Hand of the King

[godsfavoritefag]

I did some digging into the sources of these!

Image One: I couldn't find much on this but this reply to the post seems accurate! "The first one is a graffiti from the Philippines and is most likely done by the organization, Kilusang Mayo Uno (May 1st Labor Movement)." @maria-sinukuan

Image Two: Enrique Cedillo, a Mexican artist. Here's an article about him and here's his art Facebook, both in Spanish.

Image Three: A cover of Der Hammer, a Yiddish-Jewish leftist magazine in the 1920s and 30s. The text on the left leg is (I think) this:

א‎ס‎ל‎

קאטלעל

Google Translate says it means "Yoke Kathleen" but if anyone knows what they're doing in regards to Hebrew I'd love to be corrected.

Image Four: William Gropper, who did a lot of political art and many covers of the previously mentioned Der Hammer.

Image Five: Seth Tobocman. Here's his Wikipedia article.

Image Six: @wrenmcdonald

Image Seven: Unknown, as far as I can tell.

Image Eight: Boris Parmeev

Image Nine: Unknown (to me)

Image Ten: Nikolai Mikhailovich Kochergin

If I have anything wrong please let me know, I just did a lot of reverse image searching.

A political art moodboard I assembled. (I know all art is political.)

I gathered these from the internet; I have not got the credits, so if anyone has, do let me know and I'll add them.

[oldsardens]

William Gropper - Air Raid in Spain

[audiemurphy1945]

William Gropper, Prosecutor, 1953

[mybeingthere]

WILLIAM GROPPER Senators. Oil on masonite, 1940-50. 360x362 mm; 14 1/8x14 1/4 inches.

[alwaysalwaysalwaysthesea]

Illustration by William Gropper in the February 20, 1934 New Masses.

(source: marxists.org)

[arlopez]

Blog 9 – Evidentiary Realism and Investigative Aesthetics

“Evidentiary Realism” by Paolo Cirio

In this piece, artist Paolo Cirio outlines the return of realism, specifically of “Evidentiary Realism.” Realism has returned to art recently through the clash and cooperation of investigative practices, forensic documentaries, and artistic aesthetics. Realist art has always been a powerful tool to denounce the dirt conceived under societies, and now it has a new aesthetic, updated to our modern times.

According to the author, reality is now out of sight. It is so complex nowadays that it is not easily tangible. Even if we can see the consequences of our reality sometimes because of its complexity and multidisciplinary structural nature we fail to see its agents and originating systems. Nowadays the real is so interconnected with the power structures that stem from language, infrastructure, data, technology, and surveillance that it constitutes a post-visual condition. We are now in front of systems that have capacities so sophisticated and automated (the opposite of humans) that the human eyes cannot depict them, they are made invisible.

Earshot by Lawrence Abu Hamdan

That is why Evidentiary Realism is now an aesthetic and social tool to analyze the underlying economic, political, legal, and cultural factors that shape society and its shortcomings. To piece together complex puzzle pieces of our reality and create a realistic artistic denouncement to see what is out of sight. The author also refers to its “post-spectacular” characteristics. In fact, Evidentiary Realism with the aestheticization of evidence also aims to synthesize complexity and make it accessible to everyone, evoking emotional responses and instilling knowledge simultaneously.

Technological development allows artists to investigate reality as never before. Evidence is now in so many different forms. And for these forms, even counter forms exist, with for example black boxes being interrogated by counter black boxes and systems to study artificial intelligence. Not only the means of investigations have evolved, but also the forums of presentation and discussions expanded (spaces that lead to the public legitimization of evidence). Nowadays with the immense scope of the internet and social media, the audience has grown immensely and therefore also the needed recognition standard for the evidence.

Enhanced realism in documentary arty refers to “forensic information” which broadly conceptualizes deep media analysis with a different range of techniques and “forensic linguistic” to analyze the media content into investigative discussions. The outcomes of these processes (investigative art and aesthetics) cannot be used in courts as evidence, it is not legally binding. However, it does as classical realism teaches us to raise awareness and act as an agent for change. Moreover, it is defiant in its own existence, questioning the politics of representation with questions on artmaking and its role.

The aesthetic complements the investigative with juxtapositions, ready-mades, reconstructions, compositions, and mapping that reveal the networks between social issues and the systems. There is no subjectivity in the aesthetics, however. No political slogan or conclusion attached to the author’s opinion has to be deduced by it. The piece should speak and denounce for itself.

Cirio believes it is back now because of enhanced social crises which have arisen in the last decades provoking a widespread interest in the exposure of truth and social challenging of systems. Realism in art has fluctuated and now it is time again for society to take over aesthetics. Uncovering the real is being opposed in an authoritarian fashion in many outlets and with the advent of fake news normalization, there is an urgency for a widespread return to realism.

William Gropper, “Little Steel,” ca. 1937, oil on canvas. A piece from the American Social Realism post-war movement

Introduction by Fuller and Weizman

The Introduction of "Investigative Aesthetics" by Fuller and Weizman presents an exploration of the intersection of art, aesthetics, and investigative tactics.

The authors argue that investigative aesthetics provides a valuable framework for understanding and engaging with complex systems of power, as well as a means of generating knowledge and action. Investigative Aesthetics basically consists of the practice of critically collecting and then visually reporting pieces of reports of happenings from media clutter to shape a big picture of a happening. Collaboration between professionals from many professions, as well as people's direct experience of an incident, is vital in the inquiry. The use of aesthetics in investigations can help to create new modes of perception and understanding and can reveal the hidden dimensions of conflicts and human rights abuses. Investigative aesthetics can also help to engage the public in investigations and create a broader understanding of the issues at hand.

Fuller and Weizman begin by discussing the origins of investigative aesthetics, tracing its roots to the practices of art and activism in the 1960s and 1970s. During this period, artists began to experiment with new forms of representation and visual language, often working in collaboration with activists and social movements to address issues such as war, poverty, and social injustice. These artists sought to use art as a means of provoking critical reflection and political action, and their work laid the foundation for the emergence of investigative aesthetics.

The introduction also describes some of Forensic Architecture's investigations, including their investigation into the use of tear gas by Israeli forces in the West Bank and their investigation into the Grenfell Tower fire in London. These investigations demonstrate the agency's approach to using architecture and aesthetics as tools for investigation and how their work reveals the political and social contexts of conflicts and human rights abuses.

Forensic Architecture's investigations are about collecting data and evidence and understanding the power dynamics and political motivations that drive conflicts. By using aesthetics as investigation tools, the agency can reveal the hidden political and social dimensions of conflicts and human rights abuses. It is also acknowledged how Forensic Architecture uses AI to automate the act of seeing. The AI machines have been trained by being “fed” certain datasets and collections of labeled images. Because the “feeders” are human and part of society, the “food” is influenced by their biases, conscious or unconscious.

A still from Forensic Architecture’s video on the explosion in Beirut.

The authors then turn to a broader discussion of the role of aesthetics in investigative work. They argue that aesthetics should be understood as a set of practices and techniques that are used to produce and communicate meaning. In this context, investigative aesthetics refers to the use of these practices and techniques to explore and expose hidden power relations and structures. This can involve a range of different approaches, from visualizing data and creating immersive environments to conducting interviews and engaging in direct action.

The authors also emphasize the importance of collaboration and interdisciplinary approaches in the practice of investigative aesthetics. They note that this field requires a diverse range of skills and perspectives, and that effective investigative work often involves artists, activists, scientists, and other experts working together to achieve common goals. They highlight the key role that technology can play in these collaborations, allowing for the creation of new tools and strategies for investigating complex systems.

The introduction also discusses the broader implications of Forensic Architecture's work. The agency's investigations not only reveal the hidden dimensions of conflicts and human rights abuses but also challenge the dominant narratives and power structures that perpetuate these abuses. By using architecture and aesthetics as tools for investigation, the agency is able to create new modes of perception and understanding that can lead to social and political change.

An 8-minute video providing a helpful overview of what Forensic Architecture does, narrated by Wiltzman himself.

Two images I have created through a free AI speech-to-image generator. The two prompts were: "Palestinian rally" and "Army of drones flying over a city"