woman as decoration (so what else is new?)

i have been trying to find the portfolio from which these images are taken for years, and, you guessed it: they're at the Wolf- sonian! all of the images are by our old friend, julius klinger, and one we've featured before. that's now two, with the hoytema calendars, searches laid to rest. but now that i see them all i'm somewhat troubled; do we duplicate too easily? do we grimace and prance as our natural practices?

i'm starting to wonder if my values aren't keeping up with the times. i'm also wondering if i'm a hypocrite. i have a google alert set up for the word japonisme, so whenever it's used online i get pointed in its direction.

for some time now, images from this blog have shown up on tumbler, but that site seems assiduously, somehow, to make sure every images is linked, one way or another, back to its source. enter pinterest, and the whole system falls apart. users link to tumbler rather than here, for one thing, or they just download images from here and assign themselves as the source.

i seem to have gotten myself really all tangled up with myself over this. then the pinterest users repin each other's pins, and soon any hint of source is non-existent. and i ask myself, given that there's nothing that can be done about it, 'should i care?'.

i know that it bothers me in part because i see things that i know required hours of work to make them appear effortlessly beautiful. but i also begin to wonder if that kind of 'ownership' in this kind of context has any meaning anymore.

add to that, i haven't always been perfect at attributing sources, so does that make me no different? i get email occasionally asking why don't i just use tumbler, as if it's getting to be that context, even any text, grows more meaningless every day as the image increas- ingly becomes all that matters.

once, back in the day, in the hippie commune where i was living in the haight-ashbury, some guy off the street (friend of a friend?) walked into my room, went through my drawers, found my little water-painting set, and began to paint. when i found him and objected, he told me i was too attached to ownership of physical things. was i a bad hippie? this is like that.

though am i any different? i spend all this time writing this stuff, and rarely read the text on other blogs. sure, i want my blog to be read, as does every blogger who puts in time, sometimes quite a bit, to write copy and context. and yet, how often do i just look at the pictures? heck, i have a whole wall of books on this subject, and how many of those have i read? i've looked at the pictures.

and isn't it a good thing, that so many people know about japonisme now (bunches of boards on pinterest! -- lots with my images)? i remember not so long ago when nobody had ever heard of gustave baumann or arthur wesley dow, let alone mabel royds ... or julius klinger. and yet i simmer and stew, as though the pixels were still part of my fingertips, and now dispersing into the ether.

do you see yourself here?

SLOWLY: a plainsong from an older woman to a younger woman

am I not....olden olden olden
it is unwanted.

wanting,..wanting
am I not....broken
stolen....common

am I not crinkled cranky poison
am I not glinty-eyed and frozen

am I not....aged
shaky....glazing
am I not....hazy
guarded....craven

am I not....only
stingy....little
am I not....simple
brittle....spitting

was I not....over
over....ridden?

it is a long story
will you be proud to be my version?

it is unwritten.

writing,..writing
am I not....ancient
raging....patient

am I not....able
charming....stable
was I not....building
forming....braving

was I not....ruling
guiding....naming
was I not....brazen
crazy....chosen

even the stones would do my bidding?

it is a long story
am I not proud to be your version?

it is unspoken.

speaking, speaking
am I not....elder
berry
brandy

are you not wine before you find me
in your own beaker?

Judy Grahn

“Slowly: a plainsong from an older woman to a younger woman” from love belongs to those who do the feeling: New & Selected Poems (1966-2006). Copyright © 2008 by Judy Grahn.

when i was a young feminist judy grahn was at every poetry reading reading her common woman poems (see some here). i once painted the text of one onto my kitchen wall.

on the 183rd day of christmas

on the first day of christmas, santa got a little confused, you know. too much nog. he used the eggs.

on the second day of christmas my true love gave to me cyclamen. and i will tell you, these things last forever. you take them for done-for and they surprise you again.

on the third day of christmas

on the fourth day

on the fifth day of christ- mas, my true love gave to me this lovely little mouse portrait. it's unusual for her work (that i've seen) in that the mice are more fully fleshed rather than drawn. yet she manages to capture their glee and curiosity nonetheless.

aren't these geese for the sixth completely wonderful??! found at mr door tree's valuable blog. this artist was new to me, but the blog features at least two of his books, every illustration a wonder.

on the seventh day of christmas... courtesans! excuse me? and yet they're dear, are they not? perhaps they intend to begin singing.

and in a truly playful spirit christmas was extended, first to high numbers, and then to infinity. it extended throughout the year.

or at least until the sun began to go away again. then it was our job to keep that light alive.

war, part 1

this has been a fascinating and disturbing direction my brain has led me into. we've talked about the strong influence of the japanese prints (particularly those of kabuki actors) on the new generation of german poster artists. simplification of image and space, outlines, and a hand-lettered style to the words. (and i only now just have realized that the handlettering blossomed so widely in germany because they already had a whole calligraphy in use in the early part of the century!)

then came world war one. countries around the world utilized the talents of the best illustrators, designers, and poster artists to send whatever message that government wanted to send to its people.

The absence of public unity was a primary concern when America entered the war on April 6, 1917. In Washington, unwavering public support was considered to be crucial to the entire wartime effort. On April 13, 1917, Wilson created the Committee on Public Information (CPI) to promote the war domestically while publicizing American war aims abroad. Under the leadership of a muckraking journalist named George Creel, the CPI recruited heavily from business, media, academia, and the art world. The CPI blended advertising techniques with a sophisticated understanding of human psychology, and its efforts represent the first time that a modern government disseminated propaganda on such a large scale. It is fascinating that this phenomenon, often linked with totalitarian regimes, emerged in a democratic state.

The CPI did not limit its promotional efforts to the written word. The Division of Pictorial Publicity "had at its disposal many of the most talented advertising illustrators and cartoonists of the time," and these artists worked closely with publicity experts in the Advertising Division. Newspapers and magazines eagerly donated advertising space, and it was almost impossible to pick up a periodical without encountering CPI material. Powerful posters, painted in patriotic colors, were plastered on billboards across the country. Even from the cynical vantage point of the mid 1990s, there is something compelling about these images that leaps across the decades and stirs a deep yearning to buy liberty bonds or enlist in the navy. 1

it didn't take very long for something to smack me in the face. these "very american" posters, designed by the likes of edward penfield, cole phillips, and cb falls, looked more like those posters of "our enemy" in this war: germany!

and of course some of the artists enlisted there for this are just those we've discussed so often. we've got lucian bernhard, julius klinger, and julius engelhard, along with others. we'll see more, from all sides, in further posts.

it's all there -- the flat planes of color, the outlines, the lettering, the elongated shapes, and the black. war posters were designed to catch the eye and to deliver an important message quickly, just like a poster advertising anything else. if the powers that be want you to use certain products and not others, if they wanted to employ you to fight, or if they wanted you to make you feel personally liable for your family's very lives, here was their tool.

the things i can never get used to are the tragic ironies. it's ironic if not tragic, that we in the US borrowed for our advantage the very tool of the other side, and often pictured them in a rather unflattering light.

and then there are the tragic. "Julius Klinger was a German artist of Jewish descent who worked for Jugend for several years, from 1896 to 1903, at the beginning of his artistic career. He later went on to be a formative force in advertising art, and ultimately died during World War II, probably at the hands of the Nazis."2

and of lucian bernhard -- his influential style brought him invitations from the united states. "Urban areas became hotbeds of advertising: bold, reductive graphic imagery was necessary to capture the viewer's attention on crowded poster hoardings. Bernhard's Sachplakat epitomized his new form, which also included other kinds of imagery in which unusually bright, yet aesthetically pleasing colors replace more subtle hues. Text was pared to a minimum."

in the early 1920s hitler was substantially increasing his power, so when bernhard, also of jewish descent) received an invitation to teach and work in new york, he made the move. "Bernhard was shuttled around the country to promote his own work and perhaps convince American art directors to consider modern design as an alternative to the overly rendered, often saccharine, painted illustration that represented American practice." 3

apparently, though, the word had already gotten through. artists in america were using the tools of the germans to fight the germans who went on to banish the ones that made the tools in the first place. now just how ironic is that.